Enchantment & Petrification: St Feaghna’s Well, Bonane

This has to be one of the most extraordinary and unusual sites yet visited. Extraordinary in so many ways: from the setting, to the monuments to the folklore. Apologies for the length of this post but I was immersed and enchanted!

Veering off the N71 from Glengarriff to Kenmare, you encounter a myriad of tiny roads, little woodlands, fords and stepping stones which lead towards the notorious Priest’s Leap – notorious for it is not a road for the faint -hearted but a seriously small, very up and down but incredibly scenic and wild route. Fortunately St Feaghna’s church, our destination, is at the start of the route and has a pull in space allowing for carefree and unstressful exploration. The scenery remains astonishing: an amphitheatre of hills in the middle of which is an ancient and intriguing collection of monuments, including a holy well dedicated to the patron saint of the area St Feaghna, also known as Fiachra or Fiachna to make things more complicated.

 St Feaghna’s church, Teampall Feaghna

It seems right to first visit the church and surrounding graveyard, known as Teampall Feaghna. This is said to be one of the oldest churchyards in Munster and judging by the height of the colossal beech tree that greets you this could be quite correct.

The path leads to the scant remains of the old church. In the 1830s John O Donovan in his  Ordnance Survey Letters described it as follows:

In the townland of Garraun in the Kerry portion of the parish is a small portion of the ruins of an old church of St Fiachna’s called in Irish Teampall Fiachna. It was forty four feet ten inches in length and nineteen feet ten inches in breadth, and its walls were three feet thick and built of very large green stones cemented with line and sand mortar. All its walls are now destroyed to the foundations except the north half of the east gable and six feet of the north wall connected to the gable. This fragment of the north wall is eight feet high and three feet thick and looks very ancient. No doorway or window remaining.

Not much remains today but a jumble of masonry and the east corner, which as shall be seen later, retains its special significance.

It is surrounded by a graveyard known as Drom Feaghna which contains an interesting mixture of tombs and headstones. Surrounding the graveyard are two walls. The inner wall is the original circular enclosure surrounding the church and is very early in origin. The outer wall was constructed as a famine relief project during the 1840s. The space between the two walls is unconsecrated ground and was later used as a cilleen, a burial place for the unbaptised. Little stone grave markers can clearly be seen.

A new feature has appeared in the churchyard and this is a wooden viewing platform close to the third and outer stone wall.

This is a very useful addition for you can now see the truly remarkable monument on the site – the Petrified Dairy, also known as the Rolls of Butter.

The Petrified Dairy, Rolls of Butter

This monument is on private land so the viewing platform is welcome but I really wanted a closer look so sought permission at the house, which was kindly given. What a treat to get up close and personal.

A holly tree stands guardian on a little knoll, an intriguing collection of stones just visible as you approach.The Petrified Dairy is in fact an enormous bullaun stone – an earthfast rock containing eight manmade scoops of various sizes, here beautifully described and illustrated in an entry in from Schools’ Folklore Collection:

In St Fiachna’s graveyard on the roadside, stands a large roughly rectangular boulder; the top and side being flat, the front erect and perpendicular, and the back sunk in the soil. The top of the rock resembles a table, and is about six feet square, with the corners facing the four cardinal points. On the surface there are hollowed out seven large bullauns or rock basins, undoubtedly artificially arranged, as shown in the accompanying scale-plan, Each bullaun is about one foot in diameter, and five inches deep, having nearly vertical side and a slightly  rounded base. In each of the seven bullauns lies a smooth, rounded or oval-shaped stone, of a size suitable to that of the inside of the basin. Rain water fills each hollow around the contained stone. This boulder is known as the Petrified Dairy, indicated as such by its seven ‘Keelers’, and seven pats of butter, one in each keeler. (028/29:0416).

A keeler is a milk cooler.

There are usually considered to be eight bullauns, including two very small ones. There is also what is interpreted as a broken quern stone in the middle of the monument containing a rather phallic looking stone, probably a later addition. The bullaun stone is jaw dropping in its aura and mystery. What does it all signify?

There is of course a story associated with its origins. This is the version Francis Joseph Bigger was given in 1898 by:

 …  a young peasant, John O Shea, a youth shy at first, but I subsequently found intelligent and full of interest. He informed me of many things I could not have otherwise known … Feaghna was founded in 363 by Saint Feaghna, who lived in Rosscarbery, in Cork. He had six brothers, all of whom were priests, and became bishops, and founded several other churches including Kilmackillogue, in Tuosist, and Killmacomogue in Kealkill … The saint only visited Feaghna every three months to say Mass, and every three years for confirmation. He held the farm adjoining Feaghna as a glebe, and had a woman there to mind the cows and make the butter; but, suspecting her honesty, he came purposely to watch her and found she went to Dunmanway market to sell the stolen butter, there being no nearer market. The saint could not stand this, and so turned the dishonest woman into a stone where she was passing and changed the butter rolls into pebbles, and placed them near the church, where they can still be seen. The churn and the other vessels that were used in the butter making were also turned into stone and placed beside the butter rolls …  (The Lake and Church at Killmakilloge, the Ancient Church, a Holy Well and Bullán Stone of Temple Feaghna, and the Holy Well and Shrine at St Finin’s, County Kerry. Francis Joseph Bigger. Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries,1898)

Mr and Mrs SC Hall visited fifty years earlier on their tour around Ireland and were similarly impressed:

Outside the burial ground is a perfect curiosity; a natural rock of a tabular form with five basin-like hollows on the surface, of four or five inches in depth, and about a foot in diameter. These are severally filled with water, and in each is a stone of a long oval form fitting the space fully. The whole forms a petrified dairy – the basins being the ‘keelers’, the ovals the rolls of butter.

The history of this strange monument is, that, in ancient times, a woman lived here, who, not respecting the commandment against thieving, at night milked the cows of her neighbours, and transferred the milk as well as the butter to her own dairy. Suspected at length, the hue and cry was raised against her; and Saint Fiachna, who led a holy life at the church we have referred to, resolved to punish the culprit. He mounted his horse to visit her, but she flet. The Saint as he passed turned her dairy to stone, and then descended the hill towards the river in pursuit of her. In crossing the stream his horse left his hoof-marks on a stone in the centre of it; this we did not choose to wet ourselves to look at, but we were assured by several that it was there. He then drove up the opposite hill-side, where, about midway, he overtook the criminal of whom he was in chase, and instantly turned her into stone; and there she still stands, the Irish ‘Lot’s Wife,’ – not, however, a pillar of salt, but a goodly dallan of six feet in height; yet still holding a resemblance to the original lady. The tree beside it grew out of the ‘kippin’ of the spancel which she carried in her hand, and with which she was accustomed to tie the cows’ legs at milking. And see what a goodly picture it now makes as a blooming hawthorn! It is a singular and striking object, standing, as it does, in the midst of a mountain of solitude. (A Week at Killarney by Mr and Mrs S C Hall, 1850)

The Halls made a sketch of the stone and tree it but the undergrowth was too dense for me to explore.

The holy tree is recorded in the Archaeological Inventory but the researchers were similarly thwarted on their visit:

In rough pasture, in a river valley. A ‘blessed bush’ was recorded near Temple Feaghna  … While a dense clump of gorse bushes, up to 2m high, was noted there was nothing to distinguish any bush as being the blessed bush. According to local information, the bush was associated with St Feaghna.

The rather dramatic and distinctly unchristian actions of St Feaghna are not unique, there are several other examples of saints using petrification as a punishment. The holy well in Kilpatrick near Carrigaline has an extraordinary story concerning St Finnian who turned wolves into stone after they had eaten his sister (he having first cursed her for staying out late), and at St Brendan’s Well in Kildurrihy near Dingle, a family was turned to stone when they went to observe the mysterious yet private moment when the water in the holy well turned into wine at Epiphany.

Incidentally there is another very similar bullaun to be seen at Kilmalkedar ecclesiastical site near Ballyferriter, also known as the Keelers or Na Beistí with a bovine story attached.

The water that collected in the Rolls of Butter was said to have a cure for warts, like many other bullans, but, unlike any other well I have come across, the rounds were paid anti-clockwise or tuathal. Normally rounds were paid ar deiseal or clockwise and going against the path of sun was considered to be very bad luck or only done if causing mischief, but this entry from the Schools’ Folklore Collection is specific in its details:

The Well of Warts

At the present time there is another way of using the ‘Dairy’, of quite a different character. It is said that ’rounds’ are paid there for curing warts. The person affected with warts must go round the rock seven times in the tuscal direction, contrary to the path of the sun. He must say an Our Father and Hail Mary at each basin, dip his finger under the water into the stone, rub the water on the warts making the Sign of the Cross on them, and in two months they will be gone. (031:0461)

The stone is aligned with the rising sun on the Winter Solstice. Another theory is that it is an astronomical observatory, the bullauns providing a map of the constellation Orion.

It’s far too easy to get distracted with the wealth of possibilities here, we better get to the well!

St Feaghna’s Well, Toberfeaghna

This lies literally just across the road from the Rolls of Butter and can be accessed via a farm gate. I was thrilled to see the spindly holy tree and unmistakable cluster of interesting stones lying in the field for I had been unable to find the well on my first visit. This entry from the Schools’ Folklore Collection describes it clearly:

Tobar Fiacna, On the opposite side of the road to the graveyard there is a path which leads to a small holy well, Tobar Fiacna, protected over by large boulders. On the top of these boulders is a flat stone having a pebble alongside it with which those making Rounds of the well, scratch on the stone the sign of the cross. Many cures were affected at this well, but it is said that was especially remarkable was curing rheumatism. (027:0461)

It is a roughly triangular construction made out of three large slabs of rock nestling against a larger rock. Clearing away some of the bracken, it’s pleasing to see that the well is still full of clear, fresh water.

On top of the largest rock lies a smaller flattened rock.

Closer inspection reveals an unusual cross etched upon it: three arms ending in triangular shapes. The stone is much worn and a pebble remains should you wish to pay your devotions.

Pattern day and Rounds

The church, the bullaun stone, the holy bush and the well were all visited during a three day Easter turas. It is likely that rounds were also paid on 29/30th August, St Feachna’s feast day. The pattern is was follows:

A Patron is held here on Good Friday, Saturday and Easter Sunday. A visitor commences his devotions at a low stone in the middle of the south wall of the old church, where he makes a cross with a pebble on the slab (which is quite worn with such marking), then he goes round the church three times, then halts in a rude shrine in the east wall, after which he goes to the graves of his relatives, then to the holy well, and finally to the bullaun stone to the south of the church. The well,Toberfeaghna, almost dry when I saw it, lies to the east of the church, across. (Francis Joseph Bigger)

The last act in paying the rounds was to turn the stones in the Rolls of Butter:

When the devotees arrive at the rock they sometimes move these stones and otherwise use them, but do not take them away, in fact it is firmly believed they could not be taken away. (Francis Joseph Bigger)

The stones were moved clockwise for cures and the granting of wishes. Similar stones are sometimes referred to as cursing or curing stones: moved clockwise for curing and anticlockwise for cursing. I don’t think there is any evidence that these particular stones were used maliciously though having said that, the saint himself was pretty adept at cursing and there is the unusual anti-clockwise round required for the curing of warts. Two local people discuss how the stones may have been used in this short film and you get a glimpse of the petrified woman herself at the end,

Rounds were paid on three consecutive days normally Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Offerings of pins, medal and coins were traditionally left in the east gable of the old church. A faded photograph was propped in the corner, the custom continuing.

It’s interesting that the stones were believed to remain where they were, as reinforced by this description:

… These pebbles should never be removed from the keelers, or some misfortune may befall the person who does so. It is said that a man took a pebble home to cure a sick cow, and that before morning all his cows were dead in the cabin and that the pebble taken came back itself and rested again in its own keeler. (028/29:0416)

Other examples of rehoming stones are St Olans’ Cappeen in Aughabulloge, Cork and the chest tomb at Tobar na Molt, Ardfert, Kerry.

Another bullaun stone, now tucked into the hedge with a flat stone on top of it, may have originally come from the churchyard and was also part of the rounds.

And one last strange story associated with this fascinating place:

Legend of Fiachna Graveyard

Long ago in the troubled times, eight men from Scairt, near Bantry, stole some cattle from Bórd Eoghainín, near Caherdaniel. The cattle were soon missed, and eight strong brave men were sent in pursuit of them. They overtook them about a mile from this school, but the Bantry men refused to give back the cattle. It was decided that the sixteen men should have a fair fight; so they selected a flat field – Ínse Gaorthadh Rais -on the banks of the river Sheen.The land is owned by Edward Egan, and the field is still pointed out. A terrible fight took place, in which they were all killed, except one from each side. One of these lay dying and he asked the other for a drink, but when the other was stooping down, he stabbed him to death. He then lay there all alone moaning piteously. At the same time some men were talking, in a public-house in Kenmare, about the seven remarkable “Bullans”, or round stones in Feachna Graveyard. They put up a bet that no one in Kenmare would go to the Bonane graveyard at mid-night, and bring down one of the seven Bulláns. A girl in the house took up the challenge, and set out. As she travelled along the Sheen, she heard the moaning at Ínse Gaorthadh Rais. Being very courageous, she went into the field, and saw that a man was lying there fatally wounded. He asked piteously for a drink, but the girl said she had no vessel to fetch it in; so he told her to take off his shoe and to bring the water in it. She gave him a drink and he had barely strength to say ‘Bíodh an chreach agat’. She collected her cattle, and drove them home. It is supposed that this incident saved the girl’s life, as she never went to Fiachna. The Bulláns are enchanted, and if she attempted to steal one, she would be in the power of the fairies for the rest of her life. (129-131: 0461)