''The Beguiling of Merlin'' is a painting by the British

Pre-Raphaelite The Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood (later known as the Pre-Raphaelites) was a group of English painters, poets, and art critics, founded in 1848 by William Holman Hunt, John Everett Millais, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, William Michael Rossetti, James ...

painter

Edward Burne-Jones Sir Edward Coley Burne-Jones, 1st Baronet, (; 28 August, 183317 June, 1898) was a British painter and designer associated with the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood which included Dante Gabriel Rossetti, John Millais, Ford Madox Brown and Holman ...

that was created between 1872 and 1877. The painting depicts a scene from the

Arthurian legend The Matter of Britain is the body of medieval literature and legendary material associated with Great Britain and Brittany and the legendary kings and heroes associated with it, particularly King Arthur. It was one of the three great Wester ...

about the infatuation of Merlin with the

Lady of the Lake The Lady of the Lake (french: Dame du Lac, Demoiselle du Lac, cy, Arglwyddes y Llyn, kw, Arloedhes an Lynn, br, Itron al Lenn, it, Dama del Lago) is a name or a title used by several either fairy or fairy-like but human enchantresses in the ...

, Nimue. Merlin is shown trapped, helpless in a hawthorn bush as Nimue reads from a book of spells. The work was commissioned from Burne-Jones by Frederick Richards Leyland, a

Liverpool Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. With a population of in 2019, it is the 10th largest English district by population and its metropolitan area is the fifth largest in the United Kingdom, with a populat ...

ship-owner and art-collector,Frederick Richards Leyland, 1832-1892
at the Center for Whistler Studies. in the late 1860s. After a false start blamed on "poor materials", Burne-Jones began work on the painting proper in 1873, finishing the body of the work by the end of 1874; however, the painting was not first exhibited until 1877 at the opening exhibition of the

Grosvenor Gallery The Grosvenor Gallery was an art gallery in London founded in 1877 by Sir Coutts Lindsay and his wife Blanche. Its first directors were J. Comyns Carr and Charles Hallé. The gallery proved crucial to the Aesthetic Movement because it prov ...

in London. Burne-Jones used Maria Zambaco, who was probably his mistress from 1866 to 1872, for the model for the head of Nimue. ''The Beguiling of Merlin'' was purchased by Lord Leverhulme in 1918 and remains in the Lady Lever Art Gallery to the present day.Artwork of the Month - January 2003 - ''The Beguiling of Merlin'', by Edward Coley Burne-Jones (1833 – 1898)
at Liverpoolmuseums.org.uk. The painting features on the covers of the books '' Possession: A Romance'' (1990), by A. S. Byatt, and

Fiona MacCarthy Fiona MacCarthy (23 January 1940 – 29 February 2020) was a British biographer and cultural historian best known for her studies of 19th- and 20th-century art and design. Early life and education Fiona MacCarthy was born in Sutton, Surrey in ...

's biography of Burne-Jones, ''

The Last Pre-Raphaelite ''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things already mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' is the m ...

'' (2011). The painting also plays a significant role in the 1991 novel ''

King Solomon's Carpet ''King Solomon's Carpet'' (1991) is a novel by Barbara Vine, pseudonym of Ruth Rendell. It is about the London Underground and the people frequenting it. Vine's novel is inhabited by ordinary passengers, tube aficionados, pickpockets, buskers ...

'' by

Ruth Rendell Ruth Barbara Rendell, Baroness Rendell of Babergh, (; 17 February 1930 – 2 May 2015) was an English author of thrillers and psychological murder mysteries. Rendell is best known for creating Chief Inspector Wexford.The Oxford Companion ...

writing as

Barbara Vine Ruth Barbara Rendell, Baroness Rendell of Babergh, (; 17 February 1930 – 2 May 2015) was an English author of thrillers and psychological murder mysteries. Rendell is best known for creating Chief Inspector Wexford.The Oxford Companion ...

References

Further reading