Local legend, recorded by Kinahan in 1889, claims that whoever can lift this central piece will discover beneath it “all the crowns of the ancient kings”. This belief ran so deep that even an experienced mason once spent an entire day at the rock with his punches, determinedly trying to prise out the square stone to reach the fabled treasure below.

The site’s modern religious significance reportedly began around two hundred years ago when Fathers Freel and Gallagher returned from their travels abroad and blessed the nearby well. Since then, the waters have attracted steady streams of pilgrims throughout summer and autumn, seeking cures for everything from lameness and sore eyes to various other ailments. The well’s reputation extended beyond healing the sick; farmers would carry its water home to sprinkle on their fields, believing it could prevent potato blight, stop corn disease, and ward off agricultural disasters. By the late nineteenth century, the pilgrimages had grown so popular that authorities constructed a public road to improve access to the sacred well.

When archaeologists surveyed the site in 1980, they found no trace of the legendary stone with its tantalising square centre. The mystery deepened further in 2006 when the rock’s summit underwent landscaping works, with new paths installed to help visitors reach the top more easily. Whether the fabled stone was lost to time, removed during development, or simply existed more in folklore than reality remains unknown; though the story itself continues to capture imaginations, linking ancient kingship myths with more recent traditions of holy wells and miraculous cures.