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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1819-29 Italy and after > First Italian Tour 1819-20 > Tivoli Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner View of Tivoli, with the So-Called Tempio della Tosse 1819

Image 1 of 2
Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘View of Tivoli, with the So-Called Tempio della Tosse’ 1819
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 13 Recto:
View of Tivoli, with the So-Called Tempio della Tosse 1819
D15479
Turner Bequest CLXXXIII 13
Pencil and grey watercolour wash on white wove paper, 200 x 253 mm
Inscribed by the artist in pencil ‘Tempio di Tose’ bottom right
Inscribed by ?John Ruskin in pencil ‘13’ bottom left
Stamped in black ‘CLXXXIII 13’ bottom left, descending left-hand edge
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
The subject of this drawing is a view of Tivoli which Thomas Ashby identified as being ‘taken on the steep high road up to the town’.1 The circular structure on the right-hand side is the so-called Tempio della Tosse (Temple of the Cough), believed to be the vestibule of a Roman villa. The ruin is situated near the Santuario di Ercole Vincitore (Sanctuary of Hercules Victor), formerly known as the Villa of Maecenas, the tower of which can be seen on the far left-hand side. The arcade visible behind the Tempio to the right is part of the substructures supporting the terrace of the sixteenth-century Villa d’Este, whilst to the left is the campanile of the Cathedral (Duomo) of San Lorenzo. Turner has included a flurry of incidental detail in the foreground, including a horse in harness, drinking from a fountain, and a flock of sheep. Like many drawings within this sketchbook, the composition has been executed over a washed grey background. Turner has created highlights by rubbing or lifting out the wash to reveal the white paper beneath.
The Tempio della Tosse was a popular artistic motif during the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, the most famous example being an etching by Giovanni Battista Piranesi (1720–1778), Veduta del Tempio, detta della Tosse for the Vedute di Roma.2 As a young man, Turner had made a watercolour copy of an image featuring the ruin, see Dr Monro’s Album of Italian Views (Tate D36448; Turner Bequest CCCLXXIII 35). Further studies dating from the 1819 tour can be found on folios 12 and 14 (D15478 and D15480).
1
Ashby 1914, p.247.
2
Luigi Ficacci, Piranesi: The Complete Etchings, Köln and London 2000, no.940, p.723, reproduced.
Verso:
Blank, except for traces of grey watercolour wash
Inscribed by ?John Ruskin in red ink ‘357’ bottom left, and by an unknown hand in pencil ‘84’ centre

Nicola Moorby
February 2010

How to cite

Nicola Moorby, ‘View of Tivoli, with the So-Called Tempio della Tosse 1819 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, February 2010, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, December 2012, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-view-of-tivoli-with-the-so-called-tempio-della-tosse-r1137754, accessed 27 December 2024.