It measures just 0.21 metres long and 0.12 metres wide, with a depth of only three centimetres, making it a remarkably slight object for a site so dramatically scaled. What survives is the rectangular shaft and the two short arms, each with a gently rounded angle on the underside, giving the cross a softened, almost tentative quality. The head is missing entirely, so the full original form can only be guessed at.

The cross came from the main ecclesiastical enclosure on the island, where early Christian monks, probably from around the sixth or seventh century, constructed a cluster of dry-stone beehive cells, an oratory, and a series of outdoor crosses and grave markers at vertiginous height above the sea. Objects like this one served devotional and boundary functions within such communities, marking sacred space or acting as focal points for prayer. Because the island environment is so exposed and the monastic settlement so remote, relatively few small portable artefacts from Skellig Michael have survived intact, which makes even a headless fragment of this size a meaningful survival. The cross is now held at the National Monuments Depot in Killarney, in the care of the Office of Public Works, rather than remaining on the island itself, where conditions would make long-term preservation difficult.