The Struell Wells were once pagan places of worship but are now strongly associated with St. Patrick. There are four wells (once famed throughout Europe as a bath house, drinking well and eye well), with water running through underground channels that are located in a secluded rocky valley beside the ruins of a chapel dedicated to St. Patrick.
On mid-Summer eve and the Friday before Lammas — August 1 is Lammas Day (loaf-mass day), the festival of the first wheat harvest of the year — hundreds of pilgrims used to visit Struell. The earliest written reference to the wells is in 1306, but none of the surviving buildings is earlier than about 1600.
The site is traditionally associated with St. Patrick, who is supposed to have come from nearby Saul to bathe in the waters. Legend has it that he blessed the wells and that he used to spend a great part of the night standing in the water singing psalms and spiritual songs. These wells are almost certain to have been the fountain, Slan, mentioned in Saint Fiacc’s hymn of St. Patrick.
Even today people come to Struell Wells seeking cures.
