Chalice Well
Glastonbury, Somerset, United Kingdom
The iron-rich red spring at the foot of Glastonbury Tor, flowing continuously and held in a garden where it has drawn pilgrims for centuries.
The well's water runs red with iron, staining the stone channel and the pool where it collects, and its companion, the White Spring, rises in the cave across Well House Lane with water that leaves white calcite instead. The legend that binds them holds that the chalice of the Last Supper was hidden here and its blood still rises in the water, one spring red and one white, and whether the visitor takes the legend as history or poetry, the water's color is simply real.
The Chalice Well Trust keeps the garden as a quiet, planted sanctuary: the well head itself is a medieval lid patterned with the vesica piscis, the garden's benches face the water, and the Lionshead fountain offers the iron water to drink. Glastonbury's wider sacred geography, the Tor above, the Abbey below, the Goddess Temple in the town, is all within a walk.
Visiting
The Chalice Well Trust keeps the garden; its visitor page carries current hours, admission, and the winter closure dates.
Photo: [Chalice Well](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Chalice_Well.jpg), Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0.
Associated traditions & practices
Visitor stories