This year, 2024, marks the 1500th anniversary of the death of St Brigid, one of the three patron saints of Ireland, along with St Patrick and St Colmcille. Brigid is believed to have to have been born around 450AD in Faughart, County Louth but she is mainly associated with Kildare where she founded a religious […]
St Brigid
The curious, the scenic and the challenging – a 2023 round up
It’s been a busy year for holy well work and the main excitement was the publication of my book Holy Wells of County Cork. This was kindly launched by Gary Branigan, author of Ancient and Holy Wells of Dublin and was hosted by the Working Artist Studios, Ballydehob. The book of course took much longer […]
Summer meanderings
In between all the excitement of the book finally being let loose into the world, I have had time to visit a few, mainly local, wells, which had so far escaped detection; and caught up with a few old favourites. Ballybane Holy Well In June Thomas Wiegandt Invited me to inspect his well in Ballybane […]
St Barrahane & St Brigid: an explore around Castlehaven
Two small, well camouflaged wells today, both with minute roads leading to them which required nerves of steel but well worth it! St Barrahane’s Well, Tobar Bearcháin, Castlehaven What a beautiful spot this is – a small, narrow, bumpy road takes you down to the unexpectedly expansive harbour of Castlehaven, the blue of the water […]
St Brigid’s Well, Castlemagner
This has to be one of my favourite wells visited so far. We had had an energetic day searching out holy wells in North Cork and this was the last on the agenda. It is not easy to find and seems to be on the fold of several different OS maps but eventually, after much […]
St Brigid’s Well, Tobar Brighde, Lough Hyne
St Bridget’s Day seems an auspicious date to start a blog about holy wells! And where better to start than Tobar Breedy in West Cork.