What makes it unusual is not any single dramatic feature but the compression of time visible across a relatively modest space: the ruins of a medieval parish church occupy the interior, a granite cross stands among the graves, and the surrounding memorials range from the eighteenth into the nineteenth century, each generation adding its own mark without entirely displacing what came before.

The medieval church at the core of the site is the oldest fixed point here, though the graveyard's records as compiled by archaeologist Geraldine Stout and uploaded to the national record in November 2011 do not specify its precise foundation date. The granite cross, catalogued separately as a distinct monument, is the kind of object that tends to attract close looking; stone crosses in Irish graveyards can range from early medieval to post-Reformation in date, and without further excavation or inscription evidence it is difficult to place this one precisely on that long continuum. The eighteenth and nineteenth century memorials that fill out the space represent the more legible end of the site's history, the period when funerary inscription became common practice for a broader cross-section of the population, not only the wealthy or the clergy.

The graveyard sits at the western end of Newcastle village, which makes it straightforward to locate on foot or by car; Newcastle itself lies in south County Dublin, west of Rathcoole. The site is enclosed, as such graveyards typically are, and the church ruin and granite cross are visible within the grounds. Visitors with an interest in medieval ecclesiastical remains or in reading the social history encoded in eighteenth and nineteenth century headstone carving will find material to occupy a careful half-hour. The stonework rewards slow attention rather than a quick circuit.