Editing Kubla Khan (section)

===Abyssinian maid===
The Abyssinian maid is similar to the way Coleridge describes Lewti in another poem he wrote around the same time, ''Lewti''. The connection between Lewti and the Abyssinian maid makes it possible that the maid was intended as a disguised version of [[Mary Evans]], who appears as a love interest since Coleridge's 1794 poem ''The Sigh''. Evans, in these poems, appears as an object of sexual desire and a source of inspiration.<ref>Yarlott 1967 pp. 310–312</ref> She is also similar to the later subject of many of Coleridge's poems, Asra, based on Sara Hutchinson.<ref>Sisman 2006 p. 338</ref>

Literary precedents for the Abyssinian maid include a description in [[Heliodorus of Emesa|Heliodorus]]'s work ''[[Aethiopica|Aethiopian History]]'', with its description of "a young Lady, sitting upon a Rock, of so rare and perfect a Beauty, as one would have taken her for a Goddess, and though her present misery opprest her with extreamest grief, yet in the greatness of her afflection, they might easily perceive the greatness of her Courage: A Laurel crown'd her Head, and a Quiver in a Scarf hanged at her back".<ref>Beer 1962 qtd. p. 266</ref> Her description in the poem is also related to Isis of Apuleius's ''Metamorphoses,'' and to John Keats's Indian woman in ''[[Endymion (poem)|Endymion]]'' who is revealed to be the moon goddess.<ref>Beer 1962 pp. 266–269</ref>