Around 1868 Burne-Jones seemed, in a number of red crayon drawings to be pre-occupied with sleeping maidens in various close relationships apparently without subject. At this time similar themes occur in the work of Albert Moore and James M Whistler, who were exhibiting in the same venues at Burne-Jones. In the case of Burne-Jones they are less abstract, but never the less they are arrangements of an abstract nature the point of difference being that the artist may have derived them for the Sleeping Beauty narrative which gave opportunity for static arrangements of the figure. In their frieze like nature they may also have been inspired by his admiration of the Elgin marbles, known to the artist since his teenage years