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

This rapidly executed but topographically accurate sketch has been confidently identified by David Wallace-Hadrill and Janet Carolan.1 It is a view from a hilltop near Evanton towards the Cromarty Firth, made on an excursion from Novar House where Turner was staying with his friend and patron Hugh Munro. Seen from the slope of Meann Chnoc the view is to the north-east, looking towards the mouth of the Firth with the North Sutor Headland in the distance at the top of the sketch. Beneath that is Nigg Bay and then Invergordon on a headland with Alness Point below. Between the two hills at the centre of the sketch is Novar Mains, a farm on Munro’s estate, and at the top left the summit of Cnoc Fyrish is surmounted by the Fyrish Monument, erected by Hugh’s uncle Hector Munro. Beneath this on Creag Ruadh another folly may be indicated.

The sketch belongs to a small group of loose-leaf sketches, many of which were made on the same off-white laid writing paper made at Carron Mill in Denny near Stirling, though there are a few sketches on paper of another type. See Sheets Associated with the 1831 Tour of Scotland Group Introduction.