When Rossetti sought models for his art, he started at home. In some of his earliest paintings, he used his sister Christina as the model and she was very much involved with the early life of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. However, she declined an invitation to join them, too modest to be named as one of the band. From the start for Rossetti, his sisters Christina and Maria, and his mother Frances were all powerful influences on Rossetti in both his art and his poetry.

Christina Rossetti (1830-1894) posed for her brother in two paintings as the Virgin Mary. Here, she is cowering in her room as the angel visits to bring her the news that she will have a baby. The room seems cramped and the angel is a threatening presence.

Christina, posed with her mother, depicts the Virgin Mary in a painting rich with symbolism. There are palms and thorns on the floor, foreshadowing Christ's last week and the pile of books symbolise faith, hope and charity. Christina, who was deeply religious, wrote poems that reflected her faith, some of which became popular carols, such as 'In the Bleak Midwinter' (1872) and 'Love Came Down at Christmas' (1885).

The best known and most controversial of Christina's poems was 'Goblin Market' (1862), a story of sisters Laura and Lizzie and their encounter with the forbidden goblin fruit, which has been interpreted in many ways from religious to sexual and even drug abuse. The poem has been illustrated by artists including her brother, Arthur Rackham and Florence Harrison. In 1973 Playboy magazine published illustrations by Kinuko Craft of a more modern take on the poem.

Elizabeth Siddal (1829-1862), or Siddall, which was the original spelling of her name, entered the Pre-Raphaelite circle as a model for Walter Deverill after being seen working in a hat shop. Her most famous role, the one that would influence how she was seen by biographers for the last 150 years, was as the drowning 'Ophelia' in John Everett Millais's 1851-2 painting. Her death by overdose in 1862 draws many historians to assume that she was suicidal, mad and doomed, like the role she played. Rossetti's art fed into this myth, in a posthumous portrayal as Dante's love, Beatrice, beautiful at her moment of death.

The perceived soap opera of Rossetti and Elizabeth's domestic life is the stuff of much fiction and at least three BBC dramas. All the excitement of his adultery and her alleged suicide overshadows her talent as both a poet and a painter that saw her exhibited both in England and America, and won her the patronage of John Ruskin. Unfortunately, what most people remember is that Rossetti had her coffin opened a few years after her death in order to retrieve the poetry manuscript he had dedicated to her. More happily, in the last few years, Elizabeth has moved from the shadow of biography to be more fully appreciated, with the publication of a collection of her poetry and the National Portrait Gallery's 'Pre-Raphaelite Sisters' exhibition.

Fanny Cornforth (1835-1909) began life as Sarah Cox, blacksmith's daughter from Sussex. After the death of the majority of her siblings and her mother, she travelled to London to stay with her aunt as a treat and whilst there was discovered by Rossetti. Legend has it that he crept up behind her and pulled the pins from her hair. When she confronted him, he invited her to model for a painting of a country girl who had become a prostitute. She agreed and adopted the professional name 'Fanny', possibly after her youngest sister.

Whilst not technically a prostitute (despite a story spread by painter William Bell Scott that Fanny was a prostitute who cracked nuts between her teeth), it is true that Fanny allowed Rossetti and his friend, fellow painter George Price Boyce to keep her in lodgings in Soho. She became Rossetti's mistress while Elizabeth Siddal was away, posing for many of Rossetti's first oil paintings of glamorous female subjects, such as 'Bocca Baciata' (1859). After Elizabeth's death, Fanny moved in with Rossetti, first as his lover and later as his carer as his health and mental wellbeing deteriorated.

Fanny was Rossetti's primary model between 1862 and 1865, after which his patrons requested a different look in his paintings. Many writers assume that Fanny became too fat and unattractive for Rossetti to painting but this is untrue. His nickname for her was 'Elephant', but Fanny had been called this from the early years of their relationship. The nickname is linked to the area they lived near - Elephant and Castle. Also, Rossetti continued to make drawings of Fanny until the 1870s, even though his oils focused on Alexa Wilding and Jane Morris. Fanny's love for Rossetti found her alone in old age and she died in Graylingwell Asylum, Sussex, in 1909.

Louisa Ruth Herbert (1831-1921) was better known as the actress 'Ruth Herbert' who made the role of Lady Audley from the play of 'Lady Audley's Secret' her own. The daughter of a brass founder from Bristol, Ruth moved as a child to London, and her tall striking appearance helped her get her first stage role at 16 years old. As her reputation on the stage grew, she was much in demand as an artist's model among the Pre-Raphaelite artists, who vied for her attention. All this was a side-show for Ruth who was assumed the management of the St James Theatre where she took on a young actor, Henry Irving, to be her assistant. She celebrated her career as an actress and manager in her cookery book 'The St James Cookbook' (1894).

Jane Burden (1839-1914) was a tall, awkward young woman with a halo of frizzy dark hair and olive skin. Her father was a stablehand in Oxford and it was assumed that Jane would work as a seamstress, until one night Jane was spotted by Rossetti in a local theatre. He and a band of his friends were in Oxford to paint a mural at the university and Rossetti declared her to be the perfect model. While she posed for the young artists, Rossetti romanced Jane, but he left abruptly. William Morris, a shy designer and acolyte of Rossetti's offered himself as an alternative suitor and Jane accepted.

Jane took the opportunity of her marriage to elevate her skills as an embroiderer into an art form, creating beautiful Pre-Raphaelite pieces, as well as designing her own 'look' in long billowing silk gowns. After the birth of her two daughters, May and Jenny, Jane became involved once more with Rossetti. His relationship with her turned into obsession, a reflection of his own troubled mental state. He repeatedly drew and painted her from 1865 until his death, even though their love affair fizzled out in the early 1870s.

Jane Morris, through Rossetti's eyes, is an imposing goddess who dominates his vision. In real life, Jane was a modest, intelligent woman who wrote publicly in defense of a seamstress who had been sued by an unfair employer. In later life, she posed for artist Evelyn De Morgan in her 1904-5 painting 'The Hourglass'. Just before her death in 1914, Jane purchased Kelmscott Manor in the Cotswolds for May and Jenny.

By 1865, Rossetti was finding it difficult to sell his canvases that featured his mistress, Fanny Cornforth. His patrons at the time wanted another model, someone less fleshly and sensuous. Rossetti found the solution when he met Alice Wilding (1847-1884), a seamstress, who he employed to be his exclusive model. He scrapped the faces out of his pictures 'Lady Lilith' and 'Venus Verticordia' and painted in the icy beauty of Miss Wilding, who adopted the glamorous name 'Alexa' as she apparently had aspirations to be an actress.

Alexa Wilding remains one of the more mysterious of Rossetti's models. She appears constantly in his art from 1865 until his death in 1882 but apparently did not have a romantic relationship with him. She was employed as a model, yet could afford a grand house in Kensington. She never married but had three children. She died only two years after Rossetti, aged only 37 years old.

Alexa's beauty enabled Rossetti to paint very commercial works that were popular with his patrons. She often portrayed stoic or melancholic women in lush gowns and jewellery. In 'Sibylla Palmifera', Alexa holds a palm, referenced in the title, hinting at spirituality. In the background are roses and poppies and a skull, which speak of love and death.

'La Ghirlandata', or the 'Garlanded Lady', shows a woman who blooms like a flower among the deep green foliage. Alexa, as the Lady, is flanked by a double portrait of May Morris who appears as both angels at the top of the canvas. Alexa travelled to Rossetti's summer home, Kelmscott Manor, which he shared with the Morris family, in order to pose for the artist.

Ellen Smith (1844-1889) had a short lived career as a model that came to a violent end. She was working as a waitress when Rossetti approached her in 1863. Being small and dark haired, she provided a contrast to his model at that time, Fanny Cornforth. Her beauty led to her being much in demand from many artists. She suffered from rheumatism and so modelling meant that she could work without as much physical strain. Her career was cut short by an attack by a man from her neighbourhood, who slashed her face so she could not model. However, she had saved enough to open a laundry and many of the artists became her customers.

For Rossetti, there was no more inspiring sight than a beautiful woman. In 'The Beloved' (or 'The Bride'), he presents a bevy of beauties including Alexa Wilding at the front and Ellen Smith on her left. Behind Alexa are Marie Ford (dates unknown) (back left) who was also sketched to be the bride in the piece, Fanny Eaton (1835-1924) (back right), a popular model who also appeared in the work of Simeon Solomon and John Everett Millais, and Keomi Gray (1849-1914), a Romany girl who posed mainly for her lover, Frederick Sandys.