Holy well, Coolnaleen, Co. Kerry

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Holy Sites & Wells

Holy well, Coolnaleen, Co. Kerry

In the farmland of Coolnaleen in north County Kerry, there is a holy well that does not appear on any edition of the Ordnance Survey maps.

Not overlooked by accident, not simply unmapped through administrative oversight, it exists instead in the older way that such places often do, known to those who live beside it and largely invisible to the official record.

The well sits within a crescent-shaped depression in the ground, a quietly unusual form that gives it a sheltered, enclosed quality. Its construction is simple but considered: the upper portion is finished in mortared stonework, while below that the walls are drystone, laid without mortar in the traditional manner. According to the landowner, the well is associated with St Brigid, one of Ireland's three patron saints and a figure whose veneration is embedded across the landscape in springs, wells, and natural features from Kildare to the western seaboard. Holy wells dedicated to Brigid were often sites of pattern days, local gatherings held on or around her feast day of 1 February, where prayers were offered, rounds walked, and small offerings left. Whether any such practice continued at this particular well in recent memory is not recorded, but the association itself signals that the site carried some devotional significance within the local community.

Because the well is unrecorded on maps, finding it relies on local knowledge rather than any marked route or signpost. The crescent-shaped hollow and the transition between mortared cap and drystone walling below are the details most worth looking for once you are in the right ground.

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Pete F
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