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Sites and Monuments Record · Ireland

Ritual site - holy well

Ardfry, County Galway, Ireland

Ordnance Survey six-inch map, 2nd edition (1888–1915) covering the location of Ritual site - holy well, Ardfry, County Galway, with a pin at the register's coordinates
Ordnance Survey six-inch map, 2nd edition (1888–1915), covering this location. Courtesy of the National Library of Scotland. The pin is ours, placed from the register's coordinates.

The record

Townland
Ardfry
County
Galway
Country
Ireland
First-edition OS map
St. Brendans Well
Latest-edition OS map
St. Brendans Well
Coordinates
53.23824, -8.97834
SMR number
GA094-003003-

Slide toward Today to fade the historical sheet and see the modern map underneath.

David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries

4 historical maps cover this location, the earliest the 1753 map "Mappa geographica Regni Hiberniae" (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries).

Historical maps covering this location

  • 1753 · Mappa geographica Regni Hiberniae (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)
  • 1790 · Composite: Ireland. (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)
  • 1869 · Ireland. (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)
  • 1891 · Ireland 16 (David Rumsey Map Collection, Stanford Libraries)

Get directions ↗

This record in the National Monuments Service's Historic Environment Viewer ↗

The National Monuments Service's description

At the NW corner of a moated site (GA094-003002-), within the grounds of Ardfry House (GA094-004---). This natural spring well (D 2.5m) is enclosed by subrectangular drystone wall (3m N–S; 2.2m E–W), which is just one course high. The well is straight sided and lined with drystone walling. According to Holt (1912, 237), it 'occupies a small bastion-like expansion of the scarp'. A tower house (GA094-003001-) was built on the W scarp of the motte, a few meters to the SE of the holy well. When visited it was obscured with the growth of ivy and ferns, and was covered over with wooden planks. A number of burials were found in its vicinity – see GA094-003004-.

Compiled by: Galway Archaeological Survey, UCG

Date of upload: 19 December 2022

References

Holt, E.W.L. 1911-12 Notes on the Ordnance Survey Letters relating to the barony of Dunkellin: iii - Ballynacourty parish. Journal of the Galway Archaeological and Historical Society 7, 205-51.

Nearby in the register

Other entries of the same register within about three miles of this one, by straight line.

Sites and Monuments Record data: National Monuments Service, Government of Ireland, licensed under CC BY 4.0. Record text is reproduced unchanged. National Monuments Service, Government of Ireland · CC BY 4.0
All Ritual site - holy well in Galway All County Galway records All Ireland Heritage registers Historical markers (US)National Register of Historic Places (US)
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