(Mary) Sabilla Novello (1821-1904)

Media credit University of Leeds

Mary Sabilla Novello, known as Sabilla to distinguish her from her mother, was the youngest surviving daughter of Vincent Novello and Mary Sabilla Novello. Like her sister Clara, Sabilla was a singer and made her debut at the Drury Lane Theatre in London on 7 January 1843, but vocal difficulties meant that she did not continue to perform regularly in public and retired from this profession in around 1849. Instead she pursued a career as a singing teacher and published guides on this subject. She could speak French, Italian, Spanish and German and translated works into English. She published several stories with her own illustrations. She inherited her brother (Joseph) Alfred Novello’s estate in 1896, along with her sister Mary Cowden Clarke, who in turn left her estate to Sabilla on her death in 1898. She died at Villa Novello in Genoa, Italy, on 8 January 1904 and is buried at the Cimitero monumentale di Staglieno (Monumental Cemetery of Staglieno) in Genoa. Her gravestone also memorialises the names of her sister Cecila Serle, brother (Joseph) Alfred Novello, sister Mary Cowden Clarke and brother-in-law Charles Cowden Clark, whose own graves no longer exist.