It arrived in the capital already damaged, split lengthwise along its body, meaning that whatever name or formula once opened its inscription is simply gone. What remains is tantalising enough: a partial ogham text, carved in a script that predates the Latin alphabet's widespread adoption in Ireland and works by scoring notches and lines along the edge of a stone rather than across a flat surface.

Ogham, for those unfamiliar with it, is an early medieval alphabet typically used to commemorate the dead, recording names and lineage in a terse, formulaic way. This stone's surviving text, read by the scholar R.A.S. Macalister along what he called the sinister angle, gives MAQI RECTA, meaning roughly "son of Recta" or "son of the straight one," though the name that would have preceded it is lost with the missing half. The stone's origins are disputed in the details but broadly consistent: the scholar John Rhys, citing earlier work by Graves, placed its discovery in a churchyard near Killorglin in County Kerry, while Macalister, also working from Graves, was more specific, noting it had first been seen standing in the churchyard at Knockane. Its current catalogue reference ties it to Churchtown in Kerry, suggesting a journey of some distance before it came to rest in Dublin.

The stone measures 1.15 metres in height, 35 centimetres wide, and just 11 centimetres thick, so it is a relatively slender survivor. Visiting it requires knowing where in Dublin South City it is currently held, as the record does not specify a public-facing display location, and it may be in an institutional or museum context rather than on open display. Anyone interested in tracking it down would do well to contact the relevant heritage or museum authority in advance, and to arrive with some knowledge of what they are looking at: a fragment of early Christian Ireland, carrying half a name, having already crossed the country once.