¹The "information boards" in the VR tour feature some photographs not made by the author. Links are provided here for the sources:
The ruins of the mill (photo by de Burgo): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:St_Feichins_Mill_7th_8th_C_ruin.JPG
The cloisters of the Benedictine Abbey (photo by Sarnia G.): http://www.tripadvisor.ie/LocationPhotoDirectLink-g186639-d1184051-i18604847-Fore_Abbey-County_Westmeath.html
The Doaghfeighin Holy Well: (photo by Louise Nugent) http://pilgrimagemedievalireland.com/2013/01/20/medieval-pilgrimage-in-honour-of-st-feichin-and-the-seven-wonders-of-fore-co-westmeath/
The mausoleum and anchorite chapel: http://desertofmyheart.blogspot.com/2012/11/a-medievel-style-anchorite.html
The cross-inscribed lintel stone (photo by Camino de Santiago): http://wandering-woman.blogspot.com/2006/06/7-wonders-of-fore-part-2.html

²Piers, Henry. A Chorographical Description of the County of West-Meath. Written A.D. 1682. Tara, Co. Meath, Ireland: Meath Archaeological and Historical Society, 1981. 63.
After the Ordnance Survey in 1837, John O'Donovan maintained that the Irish name is Baile Fobair, which means the town of Fore, and not the Town of Books. "It is stated in the life of St. Fechin that the place was anciently called Gleann-Fobhar,—Fobhar is supposed to have the same signification as Tobar, a well." (The Irish Ecclesiastical Record. Dublin: Browne and Nolan, 1888. 437-441. Google eBook. Web. <http://books.google.com/books?id=U6Q9AAAAYAAJ&pg=PA440&focus=viewport&dq=Life+of+St.+Fechin+of+Fore&output=text>.)

³Coyle, John B. The Life of Saint Fechin of Fore, the Apostle of Connemara. Dublin: Gill, 1915. 22. This text may be read in its entirely here.
It is unlikely that 300 monks and 2,000 students were in residence at any one time at St. Féichín's original monastic foundation. The early "Lives..." often make such statements exaggerating the importance of the saint due to the political concerns of the foundations that commissioned the text.
"Féchín of Fore." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 12 Jan. 2013. Web. 08 Dec. 2013. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Féchín_of_Fore>.
The saint's name is also spelled "Féchín." Some sources say St. Féichín’s death was in 665. Most sources give his feast day as January 20, the day of his death, but some sources say he is celebrated in Ireland on the 14th of February.
His name may mean "little raven." "His name is explained in this manner in a note added to the Félire Óengusso, which says that he received this name when his mother saw him gnawing on a bone and exclaimed 'my little raven!'" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Féch%C3%ADn_of_Fore)
The "Yellow Plague" In England was known as Pestis Flava, and in Ireland as Buide Connaill. It coincided with an eclipse of the sun. Some suggested it may have been smallpox. ("Thread: Yellow Plague." British Genealogy Forums RSS. Web. 08 Dec. 2013. <http://www.british-genealogy.com/forums/showthread.php/4415-Yellow-plague>.)

⁴Stokes, G. T. "St. Fechin of Fore and His Monastery." The Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland Fifth 2.1 (1892): 4-5.
The full quotation from Stokes reads: "He established island monasteries on islets lining the Galway coast, where he was the first man to preach the Gospel, and baptize the inhabitants, showing us, as his earliest Lives do, that Paganism prevailed in the extreme west of this country, even after St. Columba had converted the Highlanders of Scotland. These monasteries continued in the islands of Ardoilen and Immagia tilI the time of Colgan, and from them Colgan obtained the most ancient manuscripts connected with our saint's life."

⁵The Irish Ecclesiastical Record. Dublin: Browne and Nolan, 1888. 437-441. Google eBook. Web. <http://books.google.com/books?pg=PA440&dq=Life+of+St.+Fechin+of+Fore&id=U6Q9AAAAYAAJ#v=onepage&q&f=false>.

⁶"Turgenius." Irish Folk Tradition. Web. 08 Dec. 2013. <http://lookingatdata.com/t/286-turgesius.html>.

⁷Woods, James. Annals of Westmeath, Ancient and Modern. Dublin: Sealy, Bryers & Walker, 1907. 276-78. This text may be read in its entirety here.
The initial de Lacy construction in the valley was a motte with a rectangular bailey on the slope of the Ben of Fore to the east of the village. (Duigan, Michael V., and Lord Killanin. The Shell Guide to Ireland. London: Edbury Press, 1967. 144-45.)

⁸Duigan, Michael V., and Lord Killanin. The Shell Guide to Ireland. London: Edbury Press, 1967. 144-45.

⁹Nugent, Louise. "Medieval Pilgrimage in Honour of St Féichín and the Seven Wonders' of Fore, Co Westmeath." Pilgrimage In Medieval Ireland. 20 Jan. 2013. Web. 08 Dec. 2013. <http://pilgrimagemedievalireland.com/2013/01/20/medieval-pilgrimage-in-honour-of-st-feichin-and-the-seven-wonders-of-fore-co-westmeath/>.
According to the author, "The earliest written evidence of pilgrimage dates to AD 1607 when Fore is listed among the 12 Irish sites granted a plenary indulgence to the faithful, by Pope Paul V."

¹⁰G. B. "Fore Abbey, County Westmeath." The Dublin Penny Journal 3.152 (1835): 380-81..

¹¹Stokes 11.

¹²Apprently there is one other remnant of an Irish medieval Benedictine foundation yet to be seen: St. John's Benedictine Priory in Youghal, currently (2013) a tapas restaurant called "The Priory." If you look closely at the photograph on this page, you will note the Gothic doorway.

¹³Nugent, Louise. "Medieval Pilgrimage in Honour of St Féichín and the Seven Wonders' of Fore, Co Westmeath." Pilgrimage In Medieval Ireland. 20 Jan. 2013. Web. 08 Dec. 2013. <http://pilgrimagemedievalireland.com/2013/01/20/medieval-pilgrimage-in-honour-of-st-feichin-and-the-seven-wonders-of-fore-co-westmeath/>.

¹⁴Smythe, William B. "On the Bell from Lough Lene in the Academy's Museum." Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. Polite Literature and Antiquities 2 (1879-1888): 165.

¹⁵Stokes 5-11.

¹⁶Brenneman, Walter L., and Mary G. Brenneman. Crossing the Circle at the Holy Wells of Ireland. Charlottesville: University of Virginia, 1995. 53-54.

¹⁷Finnegan, Aengus. "The Tobernacogany Holy Well." Message to the author. 3 Jan. 2014. E-mail.
According to Finnegan, who has completed a PhD with his research on the placenames of two baronies in Co. Westmeath: "'Cogaine' is a genitive form, of, it seems, 'cuigeann' (see also the Dictionary of the Irish Language under 'cucann') which means 'churning ('of milk') or simply 'churn'. This word is a borrowing from Latin 'coquina' 'kitchen' and in earlier Irish signified 'kitchen.' Dinneen's Irish-English dictionary (1927) also gives 'a kitchen' as a meaning of 'cuigeann.' The most likely derivation for Tobar na Cogaine is 'well of the kitchen', which, in a monastic context, is quite interesting. Paul Walsh (The Placenames of Westmeath, 63, note 1) also gives this derivation."

¹⁸"The Fore Valley." Rough Guides. Web. 08 Dec. 2013. <http://www.roughguides.com/destinations/europe/ireland/midlands-westmeath-longford-offaly-laois/northern-westmeath/fore-valley/>.
"Greville-Nugent Mausoleum, Fore, County Westmeath." National Inventory of Architectural Heritage. Web. 08 Dec. 2013. <http://www.buildingsofireland.ie/niah/search.jsp?type=record&county=WM&regno=15400405>.
The date of Beglin's death is given in various online resources as 1616. His name is also spelled "Begley," (National Inventory of Architectural Heritage), or "Biglin" (Stokes, G. T. "St. Fechin of Fore and His Monastery." The Journal of the Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland Fifth 2.1 (1892): 5-11.)

¹⁹Piers, Henry. A Chorographical Description of the County of West-Meath. Written A.D. 1682. Tara, Co. Meath, Ireland: Meath Archaeological and Historical Society, 1981. 63-4.
The full text of Piers' discussion of the anchorite: "The religious person at his entry maketh a vow never to go out of his doors all his life after, and accordingly here he remains pent up all his days, every day he saith Mass in his chapel, which is also a part of, nay almost all his dweliing-house, for there is no more house but a very small castle wherein a tall man can hardly stretch himself at length, if he laid down on the floor, nor is there any passage into the castle but thro' the chapel. He hath servants that attend at his call in an out-house, but none lyeth within the church but himself. He is said by the natives, who hold him in great veneration for his sanctity, every day to dig or rather scrape, for he useth no other tools but his nails, a portion of his grave; being esteemed of so great holiness, as if purity and sanctity were entailed in his cell, he is constantly visited by those of the Romish religion, who aim at being esteemed more devout than the ordinary amongst them; every visitant at his departure leaveth his offering or (as they phrase it) devotion on his altar; but he relieth not on this only for a maintenance, but hath those to bring him in their devotion whose devotions are not so fervent as to invite them to do the office in person; these are called his proctors who range all the counties in Ireland to beg for him whom they call the holy man in the stone: corn, eggs, geese, turkies, hens, sheep, money, and what not; nothing comes amiss, and no where do they fail altogether, but something is had, insomuch that if his proctors deal honestly, nay if he return them but the tenth part of what is given him, he may doubtless fare as well as any priest of them all; the only recreation this poor prisoner is capable of is to walk on his terras built over the cell wherein he lies, if he may be said to walk, who cannot in one line stretch forth his legs four times."

²⁰Moore, Fr. Patrick. "The Tobernacogany Holy Well." Personal interview. 3 July 1998.
Whether or not the holy wells of Ireland inherited their Christian sanctity from earlier pagan practices at the wells is a matter of some controversy. Some authors consider the evidence to the affirmative "very meager." (Carroll, Michael P. Irish Pilgrimage: Holy Wells and Popular Catholic Devotion. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins UP, 1999. 55-57. A differing perspective is offered by other authors: "Ancient rituals - among them the cult of wells, trees and stones - were allowed to continue much as before, though now under a Christian label, with the lore and venerations of saints replacing the cult of deities." (Zucchelli, Christine. Stones of Adoration Sacred Stones and Mystic Megaliths of Ireland. Doughcloyne, Wilton, Cork: Collins, 2007. 69.)

²¹Allcroft, A. H. The Circle and the Cross, a Study in Continuity. London: Macmillan, 1927. V. 2, 75.
Another author wrote in 1971: "The leaders of the Church thus abandoned the struggle against superstition whenever it seemed in their interest to do so. Throughout the Middle Ages their attitude to the credulities of their simpler followers was fundamentally ambivalent. They disliked them as gross and superstitious, but they had no wish to discourage attitudes which might foster popular devotion." (Thomas, Keith. Religion and the Decline of Magic. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1971. 49.)

²²Carroll, Michael P. Irish Pilgrimage: Holy Wells and Popular Catholic Devotion. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins UP, 1999. 191-92.

²³Cambrensis, Giraldus. The Topography of Ireland. (originally published 1187) in The Historical Works of Giraldus Cambrensis, Thomas Wright, ed. London: George Bell and Sons, 1882. Pt. 2, 95.

²⁴Zucchelli, Christine. Stones of Adoration Sacred Stones and Mystic Megaliths of Ireland. Doughcloyne, Wilton, Cork: Collins, 2007. xiv-xv.
Generations of Irish clergy, both Catholic and Protestant, attempted to suppress the folk practices at holy wells and other sites. John O'Donovan quoted an earlier 1815 source regarding a well in Co. Monaghan: "It is even now visited by many of the poorer class of the R.C. Religion whose votive rags suspended on the over-hanging thorn attest their unshaken faith in its miraculous virtues. Strange! that a custom decried by the ministers, unpracticed by the more enlightened ranks of their religion should continue unsupported by precept or example. The mist of superstition which clouds the intellect can only be dispersed by the powerful rays of a widely diffused system or education. It is worthy of remark that to the many superstitious rites which have been or are yet in use in this island some corresponding superstition may be found practiced in the most distant ages and in the most remote quarters of the Globe." (O'Donovan, John, Eugene O'Curry, Thomas O'Connor, and George Petrie. Letters Containing Information relative to the Antiquities of the Counties of Armagh and Monaghan, Collected during the progress of the Ordnance Survey in 1835. Ed. Michael O'Flanaghan. Bray: Reproduced under the Direction of Rev. Michael O'Flanaghan, 1927. 27-28.)
Other authors were less charitable regarding these practices: "...when I pressed a very old man, Owen Hester, to state what possible advantage he expected to derive from the singular custom of frequenting in particular such wells as were contiguous to an old blasted oak, or an upright unhewn stone, and what the meaning was of the yet more singular custom of sticking rags on the branches of such trees, and spitting on them - his answer, and the answer of the oldest men, was, that their ancestors always did it; that it was a preservative against Geasa-Draoidacht, i. e. the sorceries of Druids; that their cattle were preserved by it from infections and disorders; that the daoini maethe, i.e. the fairies, were kept in good humour by it; and so thoroughly persuaded were they of the sanctity of those pagan practices, that they would travel bare-headed and bare-footed, from ten to twenty miles, for the purpose of crawling on their knees round these wells, and upright stones, and oak trees, westward, as the sun travels, some three times, some six, some nine, and so on, in uneven numbers, until their voluntary penances were completely fulfilled." (Hardy, Philip Dixon. The Holy Wells of Ireland: Containing an Authentic Account of Those Various Places of Pilgrimage and Penance Which Are Still Annually Visited by Thousands of the Roman Catholic Peasantry. With a Minute Description of the Patterns and Stations Periodically Held in Various Districts of Ireland. Dublin: Hardy, & Walker, 1840. 100. Dixon is here quoting the Rev. Charles O'Connor.)

²⁵"Big Turnout for Fore Pilgrimage of Hope and Healing." Westmeath Examiner. 27 May 2010. Web. 08 Dec. 2013. <http://www.westmeathexaminer.ie/news/roundup/articles/2010/05/27/3997364-big-turnout-for-fore-pilgrimage-of-hope-and-healing>.
Unfortunately the 27 degrees (81 degrees F) temperatures adversely affected some of those parading on the shadeless route. "Meath based civil defence were also concerned for people attending the pilgrimage and stewards had to gather water from people attending to bring to the ambulance when water ran out and people and children began to feel unwell and required medical assistance."

²⁶Smythe, William B. "On the Bell from Lough Lene in the Academy's Museum." Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. Polite Literature and Antiquities 2 (1879-1888): 164.
The half-size reproduction of the bell was presented to Dáil Éireann in 1931 by the widow of a former member of the House, Major Bryan Cooper. The illustration of the original bell on our page is from the Smythe article. The half-size reproduction of the bell may be seen here.