Dante Rosetti's 'The Orchard-Pit' and allusions to the Fall of Man

Dante Rosetti's 'The Orchard-Pit' mixes biblical allusions of the Fall of Man with a dash of mythical symbolism to create an interesting spin on the theme of Death and the Maiden. With the use of these literary allusions, Rosetti seems to be suggesting to the reader that Death is the Maiden, or at least the hand maid of Death...the figure through whom Death traps its victims. In "The Orchard Pit" the biblical imagery focuses …

…Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, and baited with the siren Eve, is Rosetti's means of showing man his fate. And in the same breath answering the question of why this is fate came to be. By using biblical reference to the Genesis story of Man's Fall from grace and allusions of the fatal beauty of the Sirens from Roman mythology, Rosetti points to female sexuality as the underlying cause of our immanent death.