Bullaun stone, Mollaneen, Co. Clare

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Holy Sites & Wells

Bullaun stone, Mollaneen, Co. Clare

Between documentation and disappearance lies the quiet mystery of a bullaun stone recorded at Mollaneen in County Clare.

A bullaun is a boulder or slab of stone bearing one or more cup-shaped depressions, ground out deliberately, and associated across Ireland with early Christian sites, healing rituals, and the collection of sacred water. The example at Mollaneen was a double bullaun, meaning it carried two such hollows, and its last confirmed sighting was in 1839.

The antiquarian T. J. Westropp, writing in the early 1900s, noted that the stone had been recorded at St. Tola's holy well in 1839 but was no longer present when he came to examine the site. St. Tola was a seventh-century bishop associated with Clonard and with Clare, and holy wells bearing his name carry a long devotional tradition in the region. Whether the bullaun was moved, buried, repurposed, or simply lost to time, Westropp could not say. The stone exists now only in that earlier record, a brief notation that marks its presence and, in the same breath, its absence.

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