Translation: Alexandra Sorina Radulescu
Women and Magic in the Victorian Imaginary
One of the icons of Victorian paintings is the woman who is associated with evil, a result of the misogynistic English society of the 19th century. In this article, we approach sorceresses, witches and other characters related to magic who starred in many literary stories of the time, in addition to having served as a pretext for their painters. For them, this female icon would often represent the femme fatale.

In 1848, a small group of painters joined forces with the intention of renovating British painting. They founded the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, in which John Everett Millais, Dante Gabriel Rossetti and William Holman Hunt stood out among the members. The three of them were the nucleus of the artistic movement which would spread across England during the second half of the 19th century and would mark the evolution of the Victorian painting style.
Their paintings were named pre-raphaelite because their main intention was to return to the artistic style employed before Rafael (that is, the Italian masters from Giotto to Botticelli). The brotherhood soon dissolved, but its style and ideals would permeate even British academic painting, which they had initially revolted against.
There is a fact worth highlighting that will be characteristic of Victorian painting: the main theme of its paintings came mostly from literary sources. This is explained in an aphorism by Dante Gabriel Rossetti: “The noblest of paintings is a painted poem”. This means that the pictorial works of this era are authentic poems, legends or passages from books transferred to canvas.
Although the matters dealt with usually referred to biblical stories or passages from Shakespeare, Victorians also turned their gaze to more unique subjects related to myths, legends and – as highlighted here – magic. This topic, officially considered taboo, ceased to be so if it was related to the historical or mythological. On the other hand, the bearer of this ancestral and supernatural knowledge could not be other than the femme fatale, one of the greatest icons of Victorian painting.
Mythological Characters

The first issue of Misterica Ars Secreta magazine dedicated its cover to the painter John William Waterhouse and addressed his possible connection with the occultist world. Without any doubt, this artist should have been the first on the list to represent women connected with magic. However, in this article we will analyze other authors and motives of the Victorian artistic world related to magic.
We will first and foremost mention the painter Evelyn De Morgan (1855-1919) whose works are rich in mythology. Her Medea portrayed the first woman related to magical aspects, a woman who we will focus on. Greek mythology tells us that she was the daughter of Aeëtes, king of Colchis, although her mother could have been the nymph Idyia or the goddess Hecate, according to different sources. She also was niece of the great Greek sorceress Circe from whom it is said that she learned potions and hexes.
“[Medea] was the niece of the great Greek sorceress Circe; from whom, it is said, she learned potions and spells.”
The most known passage of Medea’s story is her relationship with Jason, who arrived at her kingdom in search of the Golden Fleece and had to face different trials, almost impossible, in order to obtain it. Here is where Medea plays an important part in the story. As she was in love with him due to an arrow from Eros, she helped by giving him potions to achieve his goal. Once the trials were surpassed, King Aeëtes denied giving the Golden Fleece to the brave Jason. Medea then, using her magic, led Jason to the Golden Fleece, which was guarded by a snake with hypnotic glaze that never slept. Once the treasure was obtained, both Medea and Jason ran away together.
Her story is full of vicissitudes, but without a doubt, the most horrible episode is the one written by Euripides in the tragedy Medea. The fatal accounts are triggered when Jason abandons his wife for his desire to marry Glauce, King Creon’s daughter. Medea uses her magic against Glauce to make her burn with a magic cloak. Afterwards, she murders her own children so her father cannot snatch them away from her or subject them to the shame of being exiled.
We do not know for sure which passage of the character’s life De Morgan tries to show since it places her inside a Greek-style vaulted interior while carrying a filter in her hand. Perhaps this is just a representation of the archetype of the perverse woman (with an unfortunate ending) associated with witchcraft.
In in the works of the painter, we also discover a woman with guessing abilities, originating from Greek mythology. On this occasion we meet Cassandra and the source is once again a tragedy by Euripides, Orestes. The heroine, daughter of the Kings of Troy, Hécuba and Priam, was Apollo’s priestess. She was tempted by this god and agreed with a condition: he had to give her the gift of prophecy. Apollo kept his end of the deal, but Cassandra rejected him. The wrath of the god drove him to curse her by spitting in her mouth so that even if her prophecies were right, no one would believe her. Such was the case of her prediction about the Trojan horse which extinguished the whole kingdom because no one believed her. This passage is the one portrayed by Evelyn De Morgan in her canvas, where Cassandra appears before the burning city.

John Collier (1850-1934) is mostly known for two very relevant works: Lady Godiva (1898) and Lilith (1892). However, we will focus on another of his works, Priestess of Delphi (1981), which leads us to the oracle with the same name, the great pilgrimage center of the Greek world where people resorted to to obtain predictions about the future. The process was the following: the consultant questioned Apollo about their future and the message was transmitted to Pythia, the first virgin priestess of the Temple of Delphos (from whom the word pythoness originated). She entered the sacred grotto, sat on a tripod, drank from the so-called fountain of enthusiasm and inhaled the steam that emerged from the cave. Then, she would get into a trance where the god would reveal the answer she was looking for. The translation the virgin gave was confusing and enigmatic, so it needed to be interpreted. The moment of this trance is exactly the one Collier captures in his work.
Magic in the Arthurian Cycle
The imaginary Arthurian world is another great source of inspiration for Victorian paintings. It is full of cursed women: temptresses, witches, perverse nymphs, etc. Here we will talk about Morgan le Fay, Vivienne and the feminine spirit who tempted Percival.
Morgan was King Arthur’s step-sister and queen of Avalon. She is, without doubt, the most evil witch of this legendary cycle. While Merlin used his powers to protect King Arthur, she acted as a counterpoint by rendering his spells useless, harming the monarch and causing the fall of his kingdom.
This is the theme chosen by Frederick Sandys (1829-1904) for a preparatory drawing and a canvas that represents Morgan preparing a spell against Arthur. The witch is inside her cave pretending to cast a curse on a cloak for the king, in order for it to burn when he places this on his shoulders and, therefore, kill him. The plan failed, but Morgan still tried to harm her stepbrother and did not cease until she fell into disgrace.

Sandys addresses again the theme of the Arthurian witch in her canvas Vivienne (1863). The protagonist is an evil woman who did not hesitate to seduce Merlin so he taught her the arts of magic. Once she had learned all of his spells, she attacked the magician and fled.
The artist exhibits the bond between beauty and wickedness. The sorceress is represented wearing a luxurious necklace, earrings made of amber and a gold embroidered dress. Behind her, a fan of peacock feathers is displayed. That is how Sandys portrays the icon of the femme fatale, capable of leading a man to downfall through luxury and beauty. There are two allegorical elements that support this fact: the apple, symbol of temptation, and the withered rose, which represents the death of love in one’s heart.
“Just before he [Percival] drinks it, prey of the woman’s seduction, he looks at his sword that is stuck in the ground. This reminds him of the shape of Christ’s cross and in that moment he becomes aware of the danger. Thus, he rejects the harpy and emerges triumphant from the unfortunate situation”

The last stop in the Arthurian cycle brings us to Percival, the knight of the Round Table commissioned to search for the Holy Grail. He is the prototype of a man, Christian and a rule follower, who must defeat the forces of evil and achieve his sacred goal. On his journey, he meets a devil-woman who will try to seduce him. Arthur Hacker (1858-1919) uses this passage for his canvas The Temptation of Sir Percival (1894). The painter shows the scene in which the female devil offers the knight a potion. Just before he drinks it, prey of the woman’s seduction, he looks at his sword that is stuck in the ground. This reminds him of the shape of Christ’s cross and in that moment he becomes aware of the danger. Thus, he rejects the harpy and emerges triumphant from the unfortunate situation.
Literary sorceresses

British letters have also suggested representations of women endowed with magical powers. A painter particularly fond of this theme was Henry Arthur Paine (1868-1940), who would deal with it several times in canvases such as The Witch (1898, now disappeared) or Ondine (1890). The work we will discuss below is The Enchanted Sea (1899).
This painting is inspired by the book The Shaving of Shagpat (1856) by George Meredith. In one of its passages, the barber Shibli and his talking falcon must go in search of King Oolb’s daughter, who guards the lily of the enchanted sea. The protagonist of the story manages to reach the princess’s chambers, but when she notices his presence, she flees to sea, sailing on a shell. During the voyage, she bewitches the sailors she meets along the way. Paine’s oil painting is made up of all these elements: the witch on the shell takes up the center of the composition; next to her is the talking falcon; mysterious faces of drowned men and women float around her in the sea; and behind her, several ships anchored to the coast can be seen.

Another popular literary source in the art world is Edmund Spenser’s The Faerie Queene (1570). John Melhuish Strudwick (1849-1937) was among those who brought this author’s work into his canvases. His Acrasia (1888) depicts a witch of said name who, like the Greek Circe, turned men into swine. In the painting, we see that she has just seduced a gentleman with a potion. He lies languidly on her lap, at her mercy. Roses are scattered on the armour, the shield is half-hidden in the vegetation and the sword lies on the ground. Behind the trees, wicked maidens (like the sirens of the Odyssey) play lutes and harps. This indicates the consummation of the success of dark magic over the noble knight’s ideals.
William Russell Flint. La belle dame sans merci, 1908.
In order to close the journey through the imagery of women related to magic, we approach one of the most famous literary themes of nineteenth-century English art. The poem at hand is La Belle Dame sans Merci by John Keats (1819), where the theme of the femme fatale appears again in a veiled form. It tells the encounter between a gentleman and a lady who bewitches him with her beauty. When he succumbs, he falls into a cursed sleep for eternity. Waterhouse, Dicksee or Cadowan Cowper are some of the Victorians who depicted the theme. However, we will focus on William Russell Flint’s 1908 version.
“La belle dame sans merci tells the encounter between a knight and a lady who bewitched him with her beauty. When he succumbs, he falls into a cursed sleep for eternity”
The oil painting represents the triumph of the witch. The knight has already fallen and is prostrate on the ground with his sword on his chest. At his side lie his helmet and spear, which he will never use again. The spell has been consummated, and the sorceress smiles in delight. “She lulled me to sleep with her caresses, and there I dreamed (Ah, poor me!) the last dream I ever dreamed on the icy slope of the mountain”.
This journey has involved a brief overview of the association between women and the supernatural in Victorian painting. More examples remain, not all of which refer to literary sources, showing female figures casting spells and consulting oracles or crystal balls. Nevertheless, we believe we have touched on the main themes related to this imaginary, which combines magic and femininity, highlighting the fascination for the mystery of the Victorian ideal. In that context, women were the protagonists, although they were often associated with evil.
OpenEdition le sugiere que cite este post de la siguiente manera:
Dr. Pedro Ortega (12 de agosto de 2024). La mujer y la magia en el imaginario victoriano. El blog de Tartalo. Recuperado 14 de abril de 2026 de https://doi.org/10.58079/126oh

