The Druids, the early spiritual leaders of the Celts, were big believers in the sacredness of the earth, and in the powers of its waters.
At Castle Matrix, near the center of Ireland, there is a stone along the riverbank said to be the omphalos--the umbilical connection to Mother Earth--recognized by the Celts of the area.
Indeed, the castle's name means "Of Mother."
(To find out more about it, visit its Web site at
http://www.nebsnow.com/castlematrix. When I visited, it was not generally open to the public, except by special arrangement. These days, it is open, and houses an arts group and the Irish Heraldry Society, as well as offering bed and breakfast accommodations.)
Not far along the road, where a spring pops out of the earth, there's a Holy Well. These days, that well is sacred to St. Fiacre, patron saint of Parisian taxi drivers (go figure!). But in olden times--in the pre-Christian days of Celtic influence throughout the British Isles and the continent, those wells were sacred to the Celtic deities. In a water-rich nation like Ireland, there are bound to be a lot of wells, or more properly, springs. Luckily for the Celtic Druids, they had a lot of deities to go with them.
If you want to find an Irish Holy Well, there are three ways. Buy a local guidebook, and see if any are listed….which is not likely.
Ask at the local newsagent’s shop where local holy wells are. If he or she likes your looks, maybe you’ll find out.
But the sure-fire way is to drive along with your eyes peeled. When you see what appears to be a bunch of dirty rags hanging off bushes and tree branches at the side of the road, you’ve found a holy well. Likely, that won’t help you know to whom that well is holy. But once you’ve found it, you can go back into town and ask the newsagent. Dollars to doughnuts, you’ll get an answer.
About those ‘rags.’ People who wish to obtain the favor of the saint to whom the well is holy hang a bit of their own clothing, or a bit of the clothing for whom they want intercession, near the well.
Does it work? Hmm….there’s a more modern belief (which quite well mimics an old Druidic belief), that believing itself makes it so. Or, in modern parlance, if you think you will fail, you will. If you think you will succeed, you will. Sometimes these intercessions are for success; if the person thinks the well will help, it will, and so on.
