from? The early church father, Epiphanius, tells of a fourth-century heretical sect called the Collyridians. Made up mostly of women, they regarded the Virgin Mary as a goddess and sacrificed little round cakes to her called collyris. We have no evidence that Muhammad came into contact with this particular group, but it is not hard to see how an exaggerated devotion to Mary, together with Eastern portrayals of the Madonna and Child, might have reinforced Muslim misperceptions of the Christian doctrine