Category: Holy Wells

When water first emerges from the Earth they’re known as ’springs’ of water; those with stone troughs or basins into which the water falls are ‘wells.’ I don’t see much difference misself! And if water was of any importance to our ancestors (anyone who thinks it wasn’t is probably a bit slow…), such a clinical definition is of little importance. Many water-sites possessed great healing or therapeutic properties, as evidenced by chemical analyses (mainly in Victorian times, when a bittova craze on these wells was in vogue), aswell as folk-tradition, plus vast numbers of subjective encounters. To ancient societies – indeed, to myself – water is our blood, or the blood of the Earth. Treating this liquid as little more than a ‘commodity’, aswell as polluting it, should be a criminal offence – simple as!

St. Andrew's Well, Isle of May, Fife

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Holy Well: OS Grid Reference – NT 65375 99592

Archaeology & History

In John Dickson’s (1899) fine work on the history and antiquities of the Forth islands, he describes a number of all-but-forgotten holy and medicinal wells that could be visited in the 19th century—this one included! It was highlighted, without name, on the 1855 OS-map of the island, a short distance west of the curiously named Holyman’s Road. Aerial views of it today seem to indicate that the well was surrounded by walling, which may have been an old well-house—although the archaeological record here is silent. Mr Dickson told us:

“St. Andrew’s Well, beside the Altar Stones, contains the best water on the May and is entirely used for domestic purposes. This spring frequently dries up during the summer months and, in these circumstances, the islanders obtain a supply from Crail.”

Although it is still shown on modern large-scale OS-maps (as ‘St Andrew’s Well’), its present condition is unknown. If this has become boggy and overgrown, it is a sure case for renovation, despite its desolate geography; and especially considering that St Andrew is the patron saint of Scotland, whose festival date is November 30 (thought originally to have been Samhain, or Halloween—the old heathen New Year’s Day). If any visitor or islander could send us photos of the site, that would be awesome!

References:

Dickson, John, Emeralds Chased in Gold; or, The Isles of the Forth, Oliphant: Edinburgh 1899.
Eggeling, W.J., The Isle of May, Lorien 1985.
Mackay, Æ. J.G., A History of Fife and Kinross, William Blackwood: Edinburgh 1896.
Muir, Thomas S., The Isle of May – A Sketch, Edinburgh 1868.
Muir, Thomas S., Ecclesiological Notes on some of the Islands of Scotland, David Douglas: Edinburgh 1883.
Simpkins, John Ewart, Examples of Printed Folk-lore Concerning Fife, with some Notes on Clackmannan and Kinross-shires, Sidgwick & Jackson: London 1914.
Taylor, Simon & Markus, Gilbert, The Place-Names of Fife – volume 3, Shaun Tyas: Donington 2009.

Lady Fife’s Well, Leith, Midlothian

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Holy Well? (destroyed): OS Grid Reference – NT 27534 75794

Archaeology & History

Despite this site having a number of albeit brief literary references, from the early 19th century onwards, the history and traditions of this Well are very scant indeed. It figures in various texts that detail the historical ‘Battle of Leith’, but there is little additional information in such tomes. Even local history works pass it by with brevity.

Its present name derives from the Countess of Fife who, in the 19th century, lived in the nearby mansion of Hermitage House (and who also grafted her name onto the nearby mound of Lady Fife’s Brae); but this title seems to have been grafted onto the earlier ‘Ladie Well’, implying it had a dedication to St. Mary or more probably an earlier heathen female spirit at the waters. Although it is shown on the OS-maps of 1852 and ’53, and described in Grant’s 1883 work as being there in his time, all subsequent maps after this date seem to indicate that it had gone.

All that we know is that the waters ran into a small stone trough and that Lady Fife enjoyed her evenings here, partaking of the waters.

References:

Bennett, Paul, Ancient and Holy Wells of Edinburgh, TNA 2017.
Campbell, Alexander, The History of Leith from the Earliest Times, William Reid: Leith 1827.
Grant, James, Cassell’s Old and New Edinburgh – volume 3, Cassell, Petter Galpin: London 1883.
Harris, Stuart, “The Fortifications and Siege of Leith,” in Proceedings Society of Antiquaries, Scotland, volume 121, 1991.
Harris, Stuart, The Place-Names of Edinburgh: Their Origins and History, Gordon Wright: Edinburgh 1996.
Hutchison, William, Tales, Traditions and Antiquities of Leith, Leith 1865.
Maxwell, C.A., The Wars of England and Scotland, W.P. Nimmo: Edinburgh 1870.
Russell, John, The Story of Leith, Nelson 1922.

Red Well, Alloa, Clackmannanshire

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Healing Well: OS Grid Reference – NS 87385 93435

Getting Here

Along the A907 a mile west of Alloa and heading towards Tullibody, just before the roundabout across the road from the school fields, a small entrance takes you into the small wooded parkland. There, right in front of you as you walk in, and visible from the road, is the enclosed architectural stone walling and somewhat ruinous remains that are the Red Well, with its faded name carved on top.

Archaeology & History

Although the waters no longer run for the people to drink, this old iron-bearing spring was long of repute to the old folk of eastern Alloa. So much so, it seems, that even Janet & Colin Bord (1985) included it in their national survey of sacred wells! Like other chalybeate springs, its waters were known to be good as a tonic—which makes sense as iron fortifies the blood and general immune system. The Well was highlighted on the 1913 OS-map of the area.

References:

Bord, Janet & Colin, Sacred Waters, Granada: London 1985.
Morris, Ruth & Frank, Scottish Healing Wells, Alethea: Sandy 1982.

Westport Well, Old Town, Edinburgh, Midlothian

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Healing Well (destroyed): OS Grid Reference – NT 2511 7322

Archaeology & History

Like many others in the city centre, this old well has long since passed into history. Said by Stuart Harris (1996) to have been “about twenty-five yards east of the eastern corner of Lady Lawson Street”, the Victorian writer Alison Dunlop (1890) told it to be by “a narrow close and an outside stair gave (which) entrance to the Court-house.” It was the focus of much social activity in ages past; and although a number of public wells could be found in this part of the city, south of the Castle, the Westport Well was the most renowned. Miss Dunlop told that,

“…its waters (were) of excellent repute (and) had to satisfy the necessities of all the inhabitants of the district. The early morning never failed to see a long line of water-stoups stretching from it in either direction like the queue at a French theatre door. Not so quiet, however, for tongues, mostly feminine, wagged freely, and the ‘Waal’ news and gossip were then the equivalent for a racy morning newspaper.”

According to her account, the patience of the people collecting the water was exemplary:

“All crowding-in was fiercely resented; gentle and simple had to stand their turn; only the water-caddies had the abiding right of precedence, and satisfied their customers at the moderate rate of two stoupful for a penny. We have already mentioned these ancient aquarian vessels peculiar to Scotland. In the event of a marriage taking place—in which case the bride was responsible for an amount of house plenishing not considered incumbent or even fashionable now-a-days—the ‘stoups’ were invariably purchased by the intending husband. Indeed, the Weetin’ o’ the Stoups was the synonym for the last bachelor supper prior to matrimony. Such festivities are understood to be hilarious, happy, hopeful; and the weetin’ o’ the stoups in Old Portsburgh, as in Old Edinburgh, was sometimes very wet indeed.”

References:

Bennett, Paul, Ancient and Holy Wells of Edinburgh, TNA 2017.
Dunlop, Alison Hay, Anent Old Edinburgh and some of the Worthies Who Walked its Streets, Somerville: Edinburgh 1890.
Harris, Stuart, The Place-Names of Edinburgh: Their Origins and History, Gordon Wright: Edinburgh 1996.

Mineral Well, Dollar, Clackmannanshire

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Healing Well: OS Grid Reference – NS 9855 9804

Also Known as:

Dollar Chalybeate Spring
Dollar Spa
Vicar’s Bridge Spa

Archaeology & History

Somewhere hiding away above the north-side of the River Devon, just above the Vicar’s Bridge, a little-known healing well came into being following industrial workings in the glen in 1831 by a local iron-working company. The waters were strongly chalybeate, or iron-bearing—and as the fad amongst the wealthy was, at the time, a love of Spa Wells, this mineral spring was broadcast as a competitor of the Harrogate and Bath Spas. But it failed pretty fast, sadly.

Bottles of the water were marketed and sold as ‘Dollar Mineral Water’ in many of the large cities, but sales weren’t too good. Johnston & Tullis (2003) pointed out how the waters would have been coloured like brandy; and despite it being good for anaemia, a good tonic, and favourable in treating cuts and bruises, the mineral spring was no longer of any value as a business, dying a quick death. Local people still kept using the waters, but in recent years the spring appears to have died too.

References:

Johnston, Tom & Tullis, Ramsay (eds.), Muckhart, Clackmannanshire: An Illustrated History of the Parish, MGAS 2003.
Morris, Ruth & Frank, Scottish Healing Wells, Alethea: Sandy 1982.

Ing Well, Allerton, Bradford, West Yorkshire

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Healing Well (destroyed): OS Grid Reference – SE 1174 3443

Archaeology & History

This ‘Well of the Meadow”, or Ing Well, is one of countless springs in and around the Bradford metropolis that have been destroyed by that thing they call ‘development’. It was one of the main water sources for the villagers of Allerton village in the 19th century and earlier. Highlighted on the 1852 OS-map of the region, a singular footpath once led to the waters and no further. There appear to be no antiquarian or historical references detailing its traditions or medicinal qualities—unless of course, you know different.

The name Ing Wells is one of the most common of all titles given to water supplies in England, meaning having the same meaning and general history just about everywhere it occurs. The place-name itself was given extensive attention in two separate studies by Eilert Ekwall (1962) and Sigurd Karlstrom (1927).

References:

Ekwall, Eilert, English Place-Names in -Ing, Lund: Uppsala 1962.
Karlstrom, Sigurd, Old English Compound Place-Names in -Ing, Lund: Uppsala 1927.

Cross Well, Musselburgh, East Lothian

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Holy Well: OS Grid Reference – NT 34629 72739

Archaeology & History

Musselburgh has had an ancient fair—held upon St. James’ Day (July 25)—for many centuries. It was held along the old High Street by a more ancient Market Cross than the one seen there today. R.M. Stirling (1894) told us that, “The cross is erected over a draw-well, and in local parlance is known as the Cross Well.”

On the 1853 township map, a water ‘pump’ is shown at the very spot, with the ‘cross’ and water trough shown on subsequent maps. The Well isn’t mentioned in John Small’s (1900) description of the cross and its authenticity as a ‘holy’ well is questionable.

References:

Bennett, Paul, Ancient and Holy Wells of Edinburgh, TNA 2018.
Small, John W., Scottish Market Crosses, Eneas Mackay: Stirling 1900.
Stirling, R.M., Inveresk Parish Lore from Pagan Times, T.C. Blair: Musselburgh 1894.

Vicar’s Well, Musselburgh, East Lothian

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Holy Well (destroyed): OS Grid-Reference – NT 3452 7264

Archaeology & History

First mentioned in the Scottish Statistical Account of 1845, its name originates from being attached to the vicarage of nearby St. Michael’s church. Highlighted on the 1853 township map of Musselburgh, this forgotten holy well was described in the middle of the 19^th century by local historian James Paterson (1857). It was located near the middle of town, along a back-street south of the High Street. Mr Paterson told us that:

“At the Dam Brae there is still a well, celebrated for the excellence of its water, called ‘the vicar’s well’, from which it is believed the present manse occupies the site of the ancient vicarage. It lies to the southeast of the Brae, and the wall of the ground approaches pretty close to the mill lead, or damn, as it is called. It is well surrounded with old trees.”

When it was described by Mr Beveridge in the 1845 Statistical Account, the spring had been covered by a pump. Local lore told how the waters of this ancient Well was said by housewives to be excellent in the infusion of tea; and although its name was spoke in local dialect as the ‘Bickers Well’, Beveridge told it to mean the “Vicars Well.” There is the obvious possibility that the ‘bickers’—as in chit-chat and gossip—related to it being where local folk simply met and chatted.

When Mr Stirling (1894) wrote his account of the adjacent Inveresk parish, he told how water from the Vicar’s Well,

“was in much request till a few years ago, when its use was forbidden and its site enclosed (for) sanitary considerations.”

References:

Bennett, Paul, Ancient and Holy Wells of Edinburgh, TNA 2018.
Paterson, James, History of the Regality of Musselburgh, James Gordon: Musselburgh 1857.
Stirling, R.M., Inveresk Parish Lore from Pagan Times, T.C. Blair: Musselburgh 1894.

St. Margaret’s Well, Edinburgh Castle, Midlothian

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Holy Well: OS Grid Reference – NT 25084 73618

Also Known as:

Canmore ID 52080

Getting Here

Along the more western end of Princes Street, looking up at the castle, wander into the park below and walk towards the railway line. There’s a foot-bridge over it. Once on the other side, turn right and walk along the path for just over 100 yards until you’re just about beneath the cliffs. There, in front of you, a ruinous stone building and carved faded plaque reads “St Margaret’s Well.”

Archaeology & History

The bedraggled architectural remnants we see of St. Margaret’s Well today, is not where the waters originally emerged. We must travel 2-300 hundred yards west of the present edifice, along old Kings Stables Road near St Cuthbert’s Church, for its original position. Long since gone of course…

The history of this holy well tends to be found scattered in a number of sources—but none give us a decent narrative of its medicinal or traditional lore. Perhaps the best was conferred in W.M. Bryce’s (1912) lengthy essay on St. Margaret’s chapel where he told:

“Of the fountain in West Princes Street Gardens, also known as St. Margaret’s, and for the protection of which the Well-house Tower was erected in 1362, no legend of a similar nature seems to have survived. It was a little flowing stream of pure water, and down to the year 1821 was utilised for drinking purposes for the supply of the garrison, in supplement of the ancient draw-well of the Castle. The earliest notice of this fountain appears in a charter by David I in favour of the Church of St. Cuthbert, dated circa 1127, in which he conveys the land under the Castle from the fountain which rises close to the corner of the King’s Garden, and along the road leading to the church. It was here, in this royal garden, beside the pellucid waters of the well which was afterwards to bear her name, that Queen Margaret, in the company of her husband and children, spent many a sunny afternoon under the shade of the rugged old Castle rock.”

The carved plaque in front of the old tumbled-down well-house sadly hides no water anymore; merely some trash and heroin-addicts needles at the back. Best avoided.

Folklore

This Scottish Queen and consort of King Malcolm Canmore, ‘St Margaret’, had several days in the calendar on which she was commemorated. Mrs Banks (1941) told how, traditionally, her day is June 10:

“This day was appointed for her festival by papal decree, but in Scotland her day is that of her death, November 16. The festival of her translation was commemorated on June 19th.”

W.M. Bryce (1912) cited St Margaret’s Day to be generally accepted as June 19, which is closer to Midsummer and could easily be accommodated into local heathen traditions.

References:

Banks, M. MacLeod, British Calendar Customs: Scotland – volume 3, Folk-lore Society: London 1941.
Bennett, Paul, Ancient and Holy Wells of Edinburgh, TNA: Alva 2017.
Bryce, W. Moir, “Saint Margaret of Scotland and Her Chapel in the Castle of Edinburgh,” in Book of the Old Edinburgh Club, volume 5, 1912.
Harris, Stuart, The Place-Names of Edinburgh: Their Origins and History, Gordon Wright: Edinburgh 1996.
MacKinlay, James M., Folklore of Scottish Lochs and Springs, William Hodge: Glasgow 1893.
Morris, Ruth & Frank, Scottish Healing Wells, Alethea: Sandy 1982.
Royal Commission on the Ancient & Historical Monuments, Scotland, Inventory of the Ancient & Historical Monuments of the City of Edinburgh, HMSO: Edinburgh 1951.
Skene, James, “Remarks on hte Well-House Tower, Situated at the Foot of the Castle Rock of Edinburgh,” in Archaeologia Scotica, volume 2, 1822.

Mineral Well, Portobello, Edinburgh, Midlothian

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Healing Well (destroyed): OS Grid Reference – NT 314 735

Archaeology & History

This was one of two medicinal springs that could once be found in old Portobello village. Like its companion Chalybeate Well nearly a mile northwest, in the early 19th century those entrepreneurial types tried fashioning these waters into being a Spa Well. It didn’t really work and the fad passed after just a couple of decades—and soon after the local people had completely lost their water supply here. The best historical account of it is in William Baird’s (1898) magnum opus on Portobello. He told how the well,

“was, at the beginning of the century, situated in a garden near to the main road, where there was a well with drinking cups for the accommodation of visitors, a small sum being charged from those using it. The supply here having in some way become interrupted the spring was neglected for a time. It found vent, however, lower down and nearer to the Promenade at the foot of Joppa Lane. About fifty years ago there was a pretty large open basin, in the centre of which the water bubbled up about half a foot. It was of a red brick colour. Unfortunately on the starting of a pump on the Niddrie Bum to drain the water from the Niddrie coal pits, the supply of water was again interrupted, and this excellent mineral spring, which was strongly impregnated with oxide of iron and sulphate of lime and magnesia, ceased to flow with its former fulness.”

In 1869, the Industrialists dug into the Earth to construct their promenade and, after countless centuries, the waters of this old medicinal well finally died and fell back into the deep Earth…

References:

Baird, William, Annals of Duddingston and Portobello, Andrew Elliot: Edinburgh 1898.
Bennett, Paul, Ancient and Holy Wells of Edinburgh, TNA: Alva 2017.