Maria Zambaco and her cousins Marie Spartali and Aglaia Coronio - all daughters of wealthy expatriate Greeks - were nicknamed "The Three Graces" in London, where they were famed for their looks, wealth, independence of mind, and intelligence. Maria, uninhibited and estranged from her husband (a slightly disreputable doctor), was, as Fiona MacCarthy puts it, "a striking figure with almost phosphorescent white skin and come-hither glorious red hair." She was an aspiring artist, trained at the Slade — Burne-Jones gave her lessons in his studio and she sat to him as Cupid in 1866, when her mother commissioned Cupid and Psyche. [Modelling to love was a short step, and soon] He had "dispensed with most other models now, in favour of Maria Zambaco’s delicate, distinctly Grecian features, her large expressive eyes, well-sculpted nose and neatly pointed chin."
Three paintings by Sir Edward Coley Burne-Jones, Bt ARA (1833-1898) for which Zambaco modelled: Left: The Soul Attains: Pygmalion and the Image IV. Oil on canvas, 39 x 30 inches. Birmingham Museums and Gallery. Middle: The Beguiling of Merlin. 1874. Oil on canvas, 73 x 43 3/4 inches. Lady Lever Art Gallery, Port Sunlight. Right: The Hand Refrains. [Click on images to enlarge them.]
Burne-Jones cast her in many of his paintings: Pygmalion and the Image (1875-78), as the statue created to be worshipped by the artist; as his enchantress in the The Wine of Circe (1870); his goddess in Venus Concordia and Venus Discordia (1870-73); and his temptress in The Beguiling of Merlin (1872-77), the pursuit of the ancient magician by the sexually predatory Nimuë. Their tumultuous affair was doomed, for, despite Maria’s threats of suicide in 1869, Burne-Jones would not leave his wife for her.
There was a public scandal in 1870, when Burne-Jones’s watercolour Phyllis and Demophoön was exhibited at the Old Watercolour Society’s annual exhibition. Both figures, lovers from Ovid’s Heroides, were uncompromisingly naked and the woman’s features were unmistakably Maria’s. After two weeks of complaints, Burne-Jones removed the picture. Burne-Jones never completely deserted her, perhaps visiting her in Paris and writing to her, and she reportedly rented a studio next to his in the 1880s. Her face continued to haunt his paintings long after their affair had ended. — from "Women in Brtish Art,1834-1951," p. 24.
Note In about 1880, Zambaco gave up drawing for sculpture, studying with Alphonse Legros at the Slade and with Rodin in Paris, modelling portrait medallions, including one of her cousin, Marie Spartali.
Works in the Round
Medals
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Bibliography
"Women in Brtish Art,1834-1951" (The Maas Gallery). https://www.maasgallery.co.uk/usr/library/documents/main/maas_women_2018.pdf
Last modified 19 January 2026