I love a walk that has a purpose.
Don’t get me wrong, wandering around in the countryside is lovely, but if there’s a bit of history, mythology or a forgotten goddess waiting to be found, I’m all the more invested.
So, after a recent task to research the goddess Coventina, and finding out she has a well in Northumberland, a few of the ‘Coven’ members who are also in a seperate Witchy Walks WhatsApp group, decided there was only one thing for it – we had to go in search of it ourselves.
We parked in the Brocolitia car park, which was £6 for the day and is right next to the Temple of Mithras. Before we’d gone, I’d found a route on OS Maps that someone had created. It was a nice loop that promised not only Coventina’s Well but also two stone circles. It sounded perfect.
Well… almost.
We wandered past the Temple of Mithras, following the little arrow on the map, expecting we’d come across the stone marking the well fairly quickly.
We didn’t. Not even slightly.
We slowed down, looked around, wondered if we’d somehow missed it, but the map kept telling us to carry on, so we did.
We carried on following the route, which soon took us away from the main path and into fields full of sheep. There were definitely more sheep than people out there! Then we spotted the tiniest little froglet ever. Honestly, it was so tiny, and of course we all had to stop and admire it. It’s funny how something so small can become one of the highlights of the day, but it really was adorable.
Eventually we reached the first stone circle.
Now… maybe I’m just spoiled as having visited Stonehenge and Avebury last month, perhaps my expectations were a little unrealistic, but this stone circle was… tiny. Very tiny. Blink-and-you’d-miss-it tiny.
Don’t get me wrong, it’s still fascinating to think how old it is, but if you’re expecting something dramatic, you might be a little disappointed.
We carried on to the second stone circle and stopped for lunch before looping back towards where we’d started.
And finally…
We found Coventina’s well.
Or rather, we found the stone that marks where her well once was.
Actually, that’s also not entirely true. We found the sheep’s skull that somebody had balanced on top of the stone. Without that, I’m not convinced we’d have spotted it at all.
Who Was Coventina?
Coventina wasn’t one of the big Roman gods that everyone has heard of. She was a local Celtic goddess of springs and sacred waters, worshipped here in the North East long before the Romans arrived. When they built Hadrian’s Wall and the nearby fort at Brocolitia, they didn’t replace her with one of their own deities, they adopted her instead.
Her sacred well became an important place of worship, and over the years people left thousands of offerings in the water. Archaeologists have uncovered coins, jewellery, pottery, sculptures and beautifully carved altars dedicated to her. Some people would have come hoping for healing, others for protection, and some simply to ask for a little luck from the goddess of the spring.
I love that she was so tied to this particular place. She wasn’t worshipped across the whole Roman Empire, she was native to here in the North East of England.
Knowing all of that made it a little sadder, standing there looking at… well… a stone.
No plaque. No information board. Nothing with her name on it.
If we hadn’t spent time researching the location of the well before our walk, watching various YouTube videos trying to work out exactly where the well was, being forewarned in them that it’s hard to find, we’d have probably given up.
I couldn’t help wondering if things would be different if she’d been a god instead of a goddess. Male rather than female. Perhaps there’d be a sign explaining who she was. Maybe there’d be something celebrating the fact that this is one of the most important Romano-British religious sites ever discovered. I’m pretty sure there would be a plaque marking the spot at the very least…
Instead, unless you already know her story, she’s almost invisible.
The hiker in me that loves to be out where there are no other people around, loves that Coventina’s Well, is tucked away amongst the fields, an ancient secret lost in time.
But another part of me wishes her story was a little less of a well kept secret.
For those of us who love folklore, mythology and the old gods, places like this feel special. There’s something magical about standing where people have come for nearly 2,000 years to honour a goddess, even if all that’s left to mark the spot is a weathered stone… and a sheep’s skull.
The route was supposed to be around 11 miles but somehow, by the time we’d finished, we’d clocked up over 14 due to having gone a little off-piste a few times because we were too busy chatting to pay attention to the map (I’ll take the blame for that one being as I had the map!) and partly because we’d zigzagged trying to find Coventina’s Well. The funniest part? It actually turned out to be right next to the car park where we’d started!
I did have one moment where I quietly wondered what one of the group who hadn’t been out on one of our Witchy Walks before must have been thinking. Was she starting to wonder if we actually knew where we were going, or if she’d ever see the car park again? Hopefully the extra mileage didn’t put her off, and she’ll trust us enough to join another walk soon…
