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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1830-35 Annual tourist > Southern Germany, Austria and Venice ... > Brussels up to Mannheim - Rhine ... > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Hill and House; Medical Remedy 1833

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Hill and House; Medical Remedy’ 1833 (Inside front cover of sketchbook)
Inside front cover of sketchbook
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Inside Front Cover:
Hill and House; Medical Remedy 1833
D41099
Pencil on cream wove paper, 185 x 113 mm
Inscribed in pencil by Turner with medical remedy [transcribed in full in the catalogue entry below]
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
A sketch of a hill and a house appear below a remedy to relieve the symptoms of an upset stomach. The inscribed list of ingredients and their measures are:
‘1oz of Cinnamon [?Powder]
1 Gram of Epeccunha
25 Drops of Ladunum
2 Drams of Spirit of Lavender
2 Drams of Tincture of Rubarb
[...]
20 Grans of Carbonate of Soda
Tartaric of Potash 8 Scruples
N[...] Ether [...]
for 6 or 8’
Contemporary remedies for digestive problems particularly recommend the ingestion of cordials made from laudanum, cinnamon, lavender, potash and rhubarb. Ipecacuanha (inscribed by Turner ‘Epeccunha’) is a dried root used in preparations to treat dysentery.
A number of Turner’s sketchbooks are inscribed with remedy recipes for ailments ranging from diarrhea and vomiting to influenza and respiratory conditions. See, for example, the Oxford and Hastings sketchbook (Turner Bequest CXI), the Chemistry and Apuleia sketchbook (Turner Bequest CXXXV), and the Guernsey sketchbook (Turner Bequest CCLII).1

Alice Rylance-Watson
February 2017

1
For a general introduction to Turner’s health see the entry ‘Health of Turner’ in Evelyn Joll, Martin Butlin and Luke Herrmann (eds.), The Oxford Companion to J.M.W. Turner, Oxford 2001, pp.136–7. For Turner’s health in later life see Brian Livesley, ‘The Later Life of Turner: Body and Mind’, in (eds.) David Blayney Brown, Amy Concannon and Sam Smiles, Late Turner: Painting Set Free, exhibition catalogue, Tate Britain, London September 2014–January 2015, J.Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, February–May 2015, de Young, Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, June–September 2015. See also Alice Rylance-Watson, J.M.W. Turner's Remedy: A Cure for Bilious Bowels, Tate, 15 January 2014, http://www.tate.org.uk/context-comment/articles/turners-remedy

How to cite

Alice Rylance-Watson, ‘Hill and House; Medical Remedy 1833 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, February 2017, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, March 2023, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-hill-and-house-medical-remedy-r1202892, accessed 15 January 2025.