In his 1976 book The Virgin, historian Geoffrey Ashe puts forward the hypothesis that the Collyridians represented a parallel Marian religion to Christianity, founded by first-generation followers of the Virgin Mary, whose doctrines were later subsumed by the Church at the Council of Ephesus in 431.[1] Historian Averil Cameron has been more sceptical about whether the movement even existed, noting that Epiphanius is the only source for the group, and that later authors simply refer back to his text.[5]