One cross in particular sits quietly beside the south-western edge of the Monks' Graveyard, and it is easy to pass without a second glance. It is roughly shaped, just 0.65 metres tall and 0.3 metres wide, worn thin to only 0.08 metres. Its arms are barely distinct from the shaft, though the lower angles of those arms are hollowed out, a small deliberate gesture that confirms the cross shape was intentional rather than accidental.

The hollowed lower angles are a detail worth pausing over. This technique, sometimes called armpit hollowing, appears on early medieval insular crosses and is thought to reflect a particular tradition of stone-cutting that flourished in Irish monasticism from roughly the sixth century onward. Skellig Michael itself was founded as a monastery, probably during that same period, by communities seeking the severe isolation of an Atlantic rock. The graveyard beside which this cross stands would have held the monks who lived and died in that extraordinary place, far from the mainland, sustained by whatever fishing and gardening the ledges of the island allowed. The cross was recorded and measured by A. O'Sullivan and J. Sheehan in their 1996 archaeological survey of the Iveragh Peninsula, published by Cork University Press, which remains the foundational reference for the early Christian material on the island.

The cross stands near ground level and is easy to overlook against the grey stone of its surroundings. Visitors to Skellig Michael, which is accessible by licensed boat from ports including Portmagee and Ballinskelligs during the summer season, are typically focused on the ascent to the monastery complex. The Monks' Graveyard lies within the main enclosure, and the south-western perimeter, where this cross stands, is worth a slower look once the more immediately dramatic structures have been taken in.