It sits loosely in the ground, as though it has drifted to its present spot from somewhere else entirely, which is more or less what archaeologists suspect. The cross measures just 0.7 metres high, with arms spanning 0.41 metres, and is only 0.05 metres thick, making it a slight, almost fragile thing. The right-hand arm has been almost entirely lost, and a chip has been knocked from the left.

The church beside which it rests is known as Temple Jarlath, named for Saint Jarlath of Tuam, the sixth-century founder of a monastic school that made the town an important ecclesiastical centre in early medieval Ireland. The cross itself was recorded by Higgins in 1987 and described as roughly cut, suggesting it was never a high-status piece of ecclesiastical carving in the manner of the great ringed high crosses found elsewhere in Ireland. Its current position is considered secondary, meaning it was almost certainly moved at some point from wherever it was originally set up. Sandstone, being softer and more workable than granite, was commonly used for carved stonework in the west of Ireland, though it weathers and fractures more easily, which may account for the damage to the arms.