That a hollow in the rock, unremarkable in geological terms, should carry centuries of religious significance is one of the quieter curiosities of the Irish holy well tradition, where the sacred and the mundane share the same wet stone.

The site, found on the western side of the inlet roughly a hundred metres north of a small quay, is associated with St Columcille, the sixth-century monk and scholar also known as Columba, who founded the famous monastery on Iona and whose name became attached to sacred sites across Ireland and Scotland over the centuries following his death. The association here was recorded by Tim Robinson in 1985, in his meticulous geographical and cultural survey of the Connemara region. Holy wells dedicated to Columcille are not uncommon along the western seaboard, but this one is unusually modest even by the standards of the tradition. There is no built surround, no niche, no votive stonework; just the rock itself, shaped by water into a shallow basin that collects whatever the sea and sky send into it.