There are beautiful examples of stonemasonry skills with passionflowers carved on headstones and tombs at Ford Park Cemetery.

Passiflora or the Passion flower is used to represent the suffering or Passion of Christ, which is particularly relevant at Easter. 

Masons depict many aspects of the story of the Crucifixion in their representation of this flower with its vines in the carvings. The use of this plant to memorialise those who have passed symbolises faith and belief in eternal life. 

Spanish Christian missionaries adopted the unique structure of this plant as symbols of the last days of Jesus and especially his crucifixion. 

According to the RHS Kew the symbolism associated with the different floral parts is as follows:

• thefive petals and five sepals taken together represent the ten faithful apostles (excluding StPeter the denier and Judas the betrayer)

• the flower's radial filaments or corona represent the crown of thorns

• the three stigmas represent the three nails and the five anthers the five wounds (four by nails and one by the lance)

• the tendrils represent the whips used in the flagellation of Christ.

Instead of an Easter Egg why not gift someone with a Passionflower plant and perhaps a book sold in the cemetery heritage centre about symbolism on headstones.