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Beware being overwhelmed when buying French property
Reader shares an experience of a sale made to an English couple
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Brexit may have been better for Britain than France thinks
Reader says timing was right but the UK could have gained more
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France’s taxe foncière: ‘I pay per year here what I paid per month in England’
A British resident in rural central France compares her taxe foncière with the property tax she paid in the UK
Calculating Christmas’ date
Reader Deirdre Hewitt makes an interesting point [about the birth of Christ, December edition], but the actualité is the opposite way round. We do not know the day of Jesus’ birth, and the year is a calculation based on the constellation that produced the “star” in 7 BC along with the confusing attempts to date it in St Luke. In the Northern Hemisphere, there are festivals before and at the time of the Winter Solstice, which acknowledge the death of the old year and express the hope that in the new year the sun will return.
Thus, Christians chose to celebrate Jesus’ Birthday at the time of Natalis Solis Invicti, the Winter Solstice, in Rome and it spread.
The major festival for Christians is always Easter.
Peter HAWKINS, Landaul
