Walthamstow Madonna

The Walthamstow Headless Madonna [ FT404:73] is situated at the entrance to Marias Gardens off Palmerston Road next to the parish church of Saint Michael and All Angels on the corner of Northcote Road – a good half-mile from Walthamstow Central and St Mary Road. It has had its head knocked off quite a few times over the years.

Andy Charles

Walthamstow, London

I would love this to be a wayside shrine, but the young lady is exposing her right leg from the thigh to the ankle – and I don’t think I have ever seen a statue where the Madonna is doing that.

• On the subject of religion: I was so pleased to see the letter from Jarett Kobek, “Pagan roots denied” [ FT404:72]. It becomes increasingly tiresome to read from various sources that Easter is really a Spring Festival, ‘stolen’ from the pagans. For reasons which I supposed would have been obvious, the date of Easter was chosen to coincide – more or less – with Passover. But then, what can you do when someone writes (on the alleged pagan origins of Christmas): “It is no accident that Christmas Day is the day of winter equinox” – except that it isn’t. And even if the writer meant the solstice, that’s not quite true either. Tina Rath

London