Maria Francesca Rossetti

She was the author of The Shadow of Dante: Being an essay towards studying himself, his world, and his pilgrimage (published 1871). She also acted as a governess during the years of family hardship brought on by her father's failing health, and tutored a young Lucy Madox Brown, a future sister-in-law.

At the age of 46, Maria joined the Society of All Saints, an Anglican order for women. Lucy Madox Brown wanted to paint her in her habit.[1] She made an English translation of the Monastic Diurnal for her order, The Day Hours and Other Offices as Used by the Sisters of All Saints, which was used by her order until 1922. She, along with her sister Christina, donated her time to the St. Mary Magdalene Home for Fallen Women in Highgate.[2] She unsuccessfully attempted to convert her agnostic brothers on her death bed.[3]

Her siblings teased her about her plain appearance, nicknaming her 'Moony' for her rounded face.[4] Maria never married. She was a friend of John Ruskin, having visited his home at Denmark Hill, and at 28 she developed romantic feelings for him after his marriage was annulled.[5]

Maria died of ovarian cancer in 1876, despite drawn-out treatments to try to drain the tumour.[6] She was buried in the convent plot at Brompton Cemetery.

illustration by Dante Gabriel Rossetti for A Shadow of Dante

• Maria Francesca Rossetti, A Shadow of Dante: being an essay towards studying himself, his world and his pilgrimage, Rivingtons, London, 1871, ISBN 978-1108060769 edition Hathi Trust Digital Library
• Maria Francesca Rossetti, Exercises in idiomatic Italian through literal translation from the English, Williams and Norgate, London 1867, ISBN 978-1108073318 edition Internet Archive
• Maria Francesca Rossetti, Aneddoti italiani: Italian anecdotes, selected from Il compagno del passeggio Campestre, Williams and Norgate, London 1867, ISBN 978-1175408587 edition Internet Archive
• Maria Francesca Rossetti, Letters to My Bible Class on Thirty-nine Sundays, Nabu Press A, 2011, ISBN 978-1271589845
• Maria Francesca Rossetti, The rivulets; a dream not all a dream, A. Dod, London, 1846, OCLC 42216558
• Maria Francesca Rossetti, Dante's Pilgrimage Through Hell, Kessinger Publishing, LLC, 2005, ISBN 978-1425344696
• Maria Francesca Rossetti, Dante's Pilgrimage Through Purgatory, Kessinger Publishing, LLC, 2005, ISBN 978-1162905099
• Maria Francesca Rossetti, Dante's Pilgrimage Through Paradise, Kessinger Publishing, LLC, 2010, ISBN 978-1162905976
• Maria Francesca Rossetti, Dante's Life Experience, Kessinger Publishing, LLC, 2010, ISBN 978-1425344689

• Rossetti–Polidori family tree

• Susan Elkin, Rossetti, Maria Francesca (1827–1876), author and Anglican nun
• Jan Marsh, Pre-Raphaelite Sisterhood, (London: Quartet, 1985)
• Dinah Roe, The Rossettis in Wonderland. A Victorian Family History (London: Haus Publishing, 2011), ISBN 978-1-907822-01-8