I've been fascinated by holy wells for many years. This sort-of arose out of my interest in churches and saints. In my teens the idea of the 'Celtic Church' caught my imagination (something to do with that romantic image of the Celtic fringe of Britain, all rain and unimagined antiquity), and gradually getting to know more about the Celtic saints I became aware that there were wells and springs named after them. When we went on a family holiday to Wales in 1984 we went looking for a few, and then discovered that there was a Holy Wells Research & Preservation Group recently established by Mark Valentine (oddly enough Mark was later part of Jennie Gray's Gothic Society too - odd how these things work out!). Anyway, that was that. Soon it became clear that the landscape was full of these strange and charismatic things called 'holy wells'. I ended up researching them wherever I happened to be - first in my native Dorset, then Oxfordshire, Leicestershire, Kent, Bucks, and now Surrey. I even wrote a book about them. Keeps me off the streets (but not out of the mud).
It's worth saying that 'holy wells' aren't always, or even usually, 'wells' in the modern sense of a dug-out structure designed to reach an underground source of water whether a spring or just water accumulated by seepage from the earth. The Anglo-Saxon word wielle from which we get the modern well meant a surface spring too, and in fact this is what most named wells are.
It's no surprise that the definition of 'Holy Well' has been something researchers in the field have argued over. Some wells are actually called 'Holy' in local tradition, while others bear the names of Christian saints. A very few have names which indicate some sort of pagan reverence in the past. These are fairly clearly 'holy' by anyone's definition. But beyond them are whole classes of water-sites called by names which may, or may not, reflect some hidden or forgotten sanctity. Sometimes they are not named at all, but a story, miraculous property or piece of strange folklore attaches to them which makes them special and these are usually subsumed within the title of 'holy well'. Sometimes people think all holy wells had healing abilities or mineral properties, but this isn't so. In fact in the great majority of cases it isn't at all clear how a particular spring came to be thought of as 'holy'.
Sacred wells and springs can be found in all continents and cultures, and there is no clear 'story' that explains them all. Sometimes you will still hear the old-fashioned view promoted that holy wells began as pagan sites and were adopted by the Christian Church and rededicated to saints who then displaced the old gods who were formerly worshipped there. This account derives from the early days of antiquarian and folklore study, and gradually became overlaid with pagan and ecological concerms. It's now mostly faded into the background as holy well enthusiasts have realised things are much more complicated. At a very few sites you can indeed trace development straight through from pagan times to Christian observances, but the past history of most wells is simply lost. Each episode in the history of human society has managed to create sacred water-sites in its own way, from pagan wells to Christian wells to spas to wishing wells.
Even after so many years I remain captivated by holy wells. They sit quietly awaiting rediscovery at the corners of fields or under hedges, keeping their secrets now as they have, in many cases, for thousands of years. Yet many are destroyed by drainage work, construction, farming, or sheer neglect, and as the British climate gets drier many wells here face disappearance and loss. Please go looking for them, and where you find them, care for them and remember them.
On other pages you'll find information about useful books on holy wells, and a list of my 'top ten'.
Surrey Holy Wells
The great survey of Surrey Wells recently concluded and has now been written up, available for the eager public to buy - hem-hem. As always, many wells have disappeared over the years, while others survive as muddy puddles or damp holes in the ground.
Far from a hole in the ground is the most impressive Surrey well I've found, the Bonville Spring at Witley not far from Godalming. Considering how amazing it is, I can't believe it isn't better known - though it isn't the easiest well to get to. In the middle of a wood across a field you find an astonishing Gothic archway through which you enter to a little chamber on the right. The water pours through a gargoyle's mouth into a small bath and then runs away down to the stream. The well gets a mention in Aubrey's Natural History of the County of Surrey in the early 1700s, and had a healing reputation then, but it must have been a simple spring until the famous architect AWN Pugin was commissioned by the Lord of Manor to rebuild the barn, farmhouse, and other buildings (which still survive) and in a flight of fancy produced this! Find out more about the area and its secrets here.
Peper Harow, or Witley according to your taste
Last year on a visit to Alnwick we noticed a St Michael's Well which is otherwise completely unrecorded. Click here for the account on www.megalithic.co.uk.
I've also managed to add an account of Our Lady's Well, Fernyhalgh, on the same site. It's only taken since February (it's now October).
Of course when we went on holiday to Italy after Easter this year (2007), I kept my eyes peeled for wells. Florence, where we were based, has a number of fountains, spouts and public watering-places which have their own names and traditions, but the only one which looks as though it might have had some religious significance is this one. Located in the Via Nazionale, It combines the Italian phenomenon of public shrines with a water-fountain and is known as the Tabernacula dei Fonticini, the Shrine of the Little Spouts. The shrine has a sumptuous sculpture of the Virgin and Child enthroned, surrounded by saints.
By the roadside in one of the villages we whizzed through on our trip through Chianti country, I spotted a fountain topped with a statue of the Virgin, but didn't get a photo.
I've become somewhat addicted to purchasing old engravings from eBay, and this is the latest addition: Gilsland Spa, Cumberland, in 1835. A very nice view of ladies in peak bonnets and gentlemen in toppers partaking of the waters from the medicinal well.
I've just been to stay at St Winifred's well, Woolston, which deserves its own page here.
My walls are now decorated by a variety of holy well-related prints, as below.
Contact Ross for more details.