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

As identified by the geographer and Turner researcher Roland Courtot, the subject of this panoramic view is Montefiascone in the Viterbo province of Lazio, bordering Lake Bolsena.1 Turner encountered Montefiascone shortly after departing from Orvieto, as he continued to make his way south towards Rome. Montefiascone features in almost a dozen works dispersed throughout the sketchbook, with a particular concentration at the end: see also folios 2 verso, 44 recto–46 recto, 47 recto, and 48 recto and verso (D41121, D21768, D21843–D21846, D21849–D21851).

The vista begins in the upper-left section of the page with the dome of Montefiascone’s cathedral, known as the Basilica of Santa Margherita. Designed by Carlo Fontana, its great lead-covered dome dates back to the late seventeenth century.2 Turner’s rendering shows the building without the two belltowers flanking the dome, a later addition by the architect Paolo Gazola in the 1840s.3 The vista is spliced in half and runs on beneath. As noted by Courtot, Turner has depicted the eastern façades of the buildings, likely from his viewpoint along the Via Cassia.4

In the bottom-right corner, inverted relative to the view above, is a side profile of the upper half of a woman.