Ritual site - holy well

The National Monuments Service's description

Situated on level ground, the well is surrounded by concrete shoring and supplies the nearby farm. When the concrete was put in there were no traces of any features around the well, which may be associated with the church (WI045-010001-) and graveyard (WI045-010002-) c. 100m to the SE at Ballinbanoge. Annotated 'St. Ivers Well' on the 1838 ed. OS 6-inch map and as 'St. Iver's Well Site of' on the revised 1885 ed. OS 6-inch map indicating that the well was filled in between these two dates. The Ordnance Survey Letters of 1838-40 recorded that there 'is another holy well on the same townland called St. Iver's [Divers] Well' (O'Flanagan 1928, 137). The Ordnance Survey Field Name Books for Arklow Parish recorded the following information about St. Divers Well; 'So called on account of people in former times bathing in it for the cure of Palsey, there has been no recourse to it for some time & is now covered with weeds and dirt' (OSNB).
Folklore collected from Arklow National School recorded the following details about this well which they called St. Ibar's Well; 'St Ibar's well is situated about one field from Rock - Castletown Road on Moncrief's farm at Clugga, Arklow Rock. A very old graveyard is near-by. The place is believed locally to have been the site of an early Danish monastery. An old local resident says that the graveyard was visited by people who prayed for the dead up to about 30 years ago. No customs are connected with the well, at present or have been within the memory of the oldest resident.' (The Schools’ Collection, Volume 0924, Page 45; www.duchas.ie)

The above description is derived from the published 'Archaeological Inventory of County Wicklow' (Dublin: Stationery Office, 1997). In certain instances the entries have been revised and updated in the light of recent research.

Revised by: Caimin O'Brien

Date of revised upload: 25 May 2020

References

O'Flanagan, Rev. M. (Compiler) 1928 Letters containing information relative to the antiquities of the county of Wicklow collected during the progress of the Ordnance Survey in 1838. Bray.

OSNB - Ordnance Survey Name Books. Pro-forma books arranged by Civil Parish for recording townland and other name-forms and compiled in the course of the OS 6-inch survey 1824-1841. The name books also include minor names and incidental references to antiquities. National Archives of Ireland.