That a modest well of this kind carried such a particular local function is not unusual in Ireland, where holy wells, traditionally understood as sites of healing, devotion, or ritual, were often woven into the practical religious life of a community. What sets this one apart, at least in the documentary record, is the confusion it generated in print.

Some six metres to the south-east of the well sits a small ruinous platform of drystone construction, roughly rectangular, measuring around 1.8 metres long, 1.2 metres wide, and 0.6 metres high. In 1947, this modest altar was described by Killanin as a megalithic tomb, a category of prehistoric monument typically consisting of large upright stones capped with a substantial capstone and dating to the Neolithic period. The identification appears to have been mistaken. The structure is in fact a simple altar associated with the well itself, part of the same local devotional complex rather than a survival from prehistoric burial practice. The well's name, given in Irish as Tobar Gráineog, carries a question mark in the scholarly record, meaning even its correct interpretation remains uncertain.