Grand Tour travellers failed to notice the Abbey of Fossanova, although when travelling from Rome to Naples, they passed very near it. Both Goethe and Dickens made some references to Terracina, but not a word on Fossanova which is on the road to that town.
Interest in medieval monuments around Rome rose after Ferdinand Gregorovius published the History of the City of Rome in the Middle Ages (8 vol.) in 1872.
In 1895 Augustus C. Hare wrote in Days near Rome: Three miles north (of Priverno) is the famous monastery of Fossanuova, which was founded by Benedictines, and existed in the beginning of the ninth century. He most likely never went there because Fossanova in fact is situated to the south of Priverno.