J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours

This page contains two loosely defined studies of buildings perched on hilly slopes. Turner’s inscription in the bottom-left corner appears to read ‘Castal’, which prompted Finberg to identify the subject as Castellina in his 1909 Inventory of the Bequest.1 However, Castellina in Chianti deviates from the route Turner presumably took along part of the Via Francigena, a medieval pilgrimage trail that stretches from Canterbury to Rome.2 Castellina Scialo is proposed here as an alternative location that corresponds more closely with this itinerary. The loose lines indicate that Turner was sketching from a moving carriage, and his inscription ‘Rd’ marks the road in the foreground. The lower view continues onto folio 2 recto opposite (D21590).