The Beguiling of Merlin is a painting by the British Pre-Raphaelite painter Edward Burne-Jones that was created between 1872 and 1877.
The painting depicts a scene from the Arthurian legend about the infatuation of Merlin with the Lady of the Lake, Nimue. Merlin is shown trapped, helpless in a hawthorn bush as Nimue reads from a book of spells.
Sir Edward Coley Burne-Jones, 1st Baronet, ARA (/bɜːrnˈdʒoʊnz/; 28 August 1833 – 17 June 1898) was an English painter and designer associated with the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood's style and subject matter.
Burne-Jones worked with William Morris as a founding partner in Morris, Marshall, Faulkner & Co in the design of decorative arts. His early paintings show the influence of Dante Gabriel Rossetti, but by 1870 he had developed his own style. In 1877, he exhibited eight oil paintings at the Grosvenor Gallery, a new rival to the Royal Academy of Arts. These included The Beguiling of Merlin. The timing was right and he was taken up as a herald and star of the new Aesthetic Movement.