The carved monstrous head, which most likely forms a corbel, is recorded as having been found on the site of the old monastery at Old Melrose. It is carved from a reddish sandstone and is broken at the back. The piece is currently housed in a stone storage site at Melrose for Historic Scotland. No medieval buildings now survive at the site at Old Melrose.

For a history of St Cuthbert's chapel at Old Melrose, see separate site report of Old Melrose.

It is likely that the Old Melrose head comes from the church of St Cuthbert's at Old Melrose, which seems to have been built either in the last quarter of the 11thc or in first half of the 12thc. The forms of the grotesque head are unusual, but its bulging eyes and long teeth can be compared with at least one corbel that comes from the old church, now destroyed, at St Boswells, also in the Scottish Borders.