These sacred springs, found throughout Ireland, served as focal points for community rituals and healing traditions for centuries. Yet when archaeologists surveyed this particular site, they found no physical trace of the well; no stone surround, no worn path, not even a depression in the earth where water might have pooled.

This absence tells its own story about the fragility of Ireland’s archaeological heritage. Holy wells were often simple, unadorned features; a natural spring marked perhaps by a few stones or a twisted hawthorn tree, maintained through use rather than construction. When communities dispersed or religious practices shifted, these sites could vanish within a generation, leaving only stories passed down through local families. The Illancreeve well joins countless other lost sites across Donegal, known only through oral tradition and place names that hint at forgotten sacred landscapes.

The documentation of this missing well forms part of the Archaeological Survey of County Donegal, a comprehensive catalogue compiled in 1983 that attempted to record every trace of human activity from prehistoric times through the 17th century. Even sites that exist only in memory, like this holy well at Leac Chonaill, earned their place in the survey, acknowledging that absence of physical evidence doesn’t diminish the cultural significance of a place where generations once came to pray, heal, and gather.