The church forms the centrepiece of a remarkable collection of early Christian monuments scattered across this windswept landscape. Just three metres southwest of the church, you’ll find the collapsed remains of a beehive structure, its eastern entrance partly built into the mountain slope. The site takes its name from Hugh MacBrick (Aodh mac Bric), a bishop who died in 588 and whose feast day on 10th November eventually proved too inhospitable for regular pilgrimages on this exposed mountain.

The sacred geography of the site extends well beyond the church itself. Three holy wells dot the immediate area, though only natural springs remain where stone surrounds once stood. Twenty metres north of the church, a cross-inscribed pillar stone rises beside what appears to be a stone cross emerging from a possible leacht, with one of the holy wells situated immediately to the west. The ridge itself serves as a penitential pathway, with approximately 26 cairns strung along both edges, marking stations for prayer and reflection; three of these may actually be the remains of ancient hut sites.

Though the “solemn pilgrimage” ceased as a regular event, individual pilgrims continued to perform the turas at Tobar Aodh mac Bricne well into the 20th century. In a remarkable revival, September 1909 saw over 2,000 people, led by local clergy, solemnly perform the traditional pilgrimage route, an event celebrated by a local poet in Irish verse published in the Derry Journal. According to the Martyrology of Donegal, Hugh was the son of Bric, descended from a line stretching back to Fiacha, and was born in Cillair of Meath before his burial alongside Bishop Assicus of Elphin at Racoo, near Ballintra.