The fragment, a rectangular block of limestone roughly a quarter of a metre long, is not set as a decorative feature or preserved behind glass. It is a voussoir, one of the wedge-shaped stones that form the curve of an arch, load-bearing and largely incidental to the casual eye. Only on closer inspection does it reveal itself as something else entirely: a border fragment from a graveslab, inscribed in Latin in black letter script, the angular, closely-spaced letterforms associated with medieval manuscript and monumental carving across western Europe.

The graveyard itself encloses St. John's Church of Ireland Cathedral, which stands on the site of a medieval church. The reuse of worked or inscribed stone in later construction was common practice throughout Ireland, and graveslabs were particularly vulnerable. When a burial ground was cleared, extended, or its boundaries rebuilt, older memorial stones, especially fragments that had already broken or shifted, could find their way into walls, gate piers, or arch structures without any deliberate act of disrespect. The Latin inscription and black letter script suggest the original slab dates from the medieval period, though the precise date and the identity of the person commemorated are no longer recoverable from this fragment alone. What survives is essentially the margin of a monument, the border that would once have framed a longer text or a carved effigy.