All posts tagged Mitchelstown

  • April 28, 2014

    ‘Doing the Rounds’: Video

    ‘Doing the Rounds’: Pattern Days at Holy Wells

    This is a collection of short clips of pilgrims completing the rounds at different holy wells. It captures some of the movements and circumambulations that occur as part of the annual Pattern Day at these places. The completion of the practices continues established traditions in honour of a patron saint, while also ensuring that the site remains an active devotional space.

    Featured in the video: St Gobnait’s Well Ballyvourney, Co. Cork, 11th Feb 2013; (2.01) St Fanahan’s Well, Mitchelstown, Co. Cork, 25th Nov 2012; (2.34) ‘The City’, or Cathair Crobh Dearg, Shrone, Co. Kerry 1st May 2013; (5.29) St Brigid’s Well, Liscannor, Co Clare, 1st Feb 2013.

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  • November 27, 2012

    St Fanahan’s Well, 2012

     

    St Fanahan’s holy well complex, Mitchelstown, Co. Cork. A collection of photographs taken on the afternoon of Sunday, 25th November 2012, which is the feast day of St Fanahan. The seventh century saint, who is referred to as a warrior monk, is the patron of the town.

    Photos, clockwise from top left: The holy well site just north of Mitchelstown, the well, with a semi-circular concrete border, is to the fore, a stone cross, some trees and a circular path are behind it; the stone cross, including a sculpture of the saint, with a sword in his belt and holding a staff, above a serpent, and a number of artificial candles surround it; a group of pilgrims do the pattern around the site, involving rounding, saying decades of the rosary, stopping at the well, blessings themselves and consuming the water; a glass, with some well water still in it, stands on a flagstone by the well, left by one pilgrim, awaiting another.

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