St Fillan's Well (Pittenweem)

St Fillin’s Well is in fact little more than a seeping wetness from the right hand wall of the left hand cave within St Fillin’s Cave. The whole cave is rather damp, as caves are apt to be, but in one spot the seeping gathers into a puddle .... a puddle that sadly we didn’t photograph, not being sure at the time that it was St Fillin’s Well.

St Fillin, an 8th century Irish monk, is said to have sat in the cave in complete darkness writing his sermons guided only by the glow emitted by his luminous left arm. Today, a switch just inside the door allows a bulb to provide just enough light for you to be able to see. Just inside the entrance cave a narrow tunnel leads up a flight of chiselled steps. They once led to the priory that used to stand on the clifftop. Further in, the cave branches into two smaller caves .... the right hand one has a small stone altar in it’s entrance, the left hand one is home to the well.

The cave is protected by a small, harled entrance way snuggled into the rock face. One wall has been decorated with sea shells, in the shape of a cross, by local school children. A heavy iron gate, also in the form of a cross, is kept locked. You can get the key (during shop hours) from the Gingerbread Horse gift shop before heading off down Cove Wynd almost to the harbour.

Pittenweem means “place of the cave”. The cave is still used for church services on the odd occasion but we found no one with any knowledge of the well.