Sites and Monuments Record · Ireland
Ritual site - holy well
Gleninagh North, County Clare, Ireland
The record
- Townland
- Gleninagh North
- County
- Clare
- Country
- Ireland
- First-edition OS map
- Tobercornan
- Latest-edition OS map
- Tobercornan (1915)
- Coordinates
- 53.13292, -9.19444
- SMR number
- CL002-010001-
Slide toward Today to fade the historical sheet and see the modern map underneath.
David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford LibrariesDavid Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford LibrariesDavid Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford LibrariesDavid Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries
Shown on 4 historical map sheets, the earliest the 1753 "Mappa geographica Regni Hiberniae" (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries).
This record in the National Monuments Service's Historic Environment Viewer ↗
The National Monuments Service's description
On the roadside with higher rocky ground, the source of the spring, rising immediately to S. Indicated and named ‘Tobercornan’ on the 1842 and 1915 OS 6-inch maps and named ‘Pinnacle Well’ and ‘Tobar Chornáin’ on Robinson’s map of the Burren (1977). A partially quarried rock pool (1.5m N–S x 1.2m E–W; D 0.2m) fed by a natural spring and enclosed in a square 19th-century Gothic Revival single-bay wellhouse. The wellhouse is built from dressed limestone blocks and has projecting corner buttresses capped with pinnacles. The roof is of corbelled rubble stone with dressed stone gable copings (NIAH). The well is entered over a small blocking stone and through a pointed-arched doorway in N wall from where three steps lead down to water level. Cunningham (1980, 36) noted that the name could refer to the Irish word for Pennywort (a plant) or to a person named ‘Cornan’.
The following images have been uploaded:
CL002-010001-_01.jpg View from N
CL002-010002-_02.jpg View from W
Compiled by: Mary Tunney and Ros Ó Maoldúin
Date of upload: 1 December 2020
References
Robinson, T. 1977 (revised 1999) The Burren: a two-inch map of the uplands of north-west Clare. Map scale 1:31680. Roundstone: Folding Landscapes.
Cunningham, G. 1980 Burren journey West. Shannonside Mid-Western Regional Tourism Organisation.
NIAH (National Inventory of Architectural Heritage) https://www.buildingsofireland.ie/buildings-search/building/20400201/tobercornan-well-gleninagh-north-county-clare [accessed 13-08-2020]
Nearby in the register
- Fulacht fiaunder 1 mi
- Fulacht fiaunder 1 mi
- Ringfort - rathunder 1 mi
- Middenunder 1 mi
Other entries of the same register within about three miles of this one, by straight line.