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

This page contains three distinct views taken from the road through the Simplon Pass. The subject of the sketch in the bottom left-hand corner remains unidentified, but the main drawing depicts the sharp lines of peaks approaching the pass, whilst the building featured in study in the top right-hand corner represents the Old Hospice (Alter Spittel), renovated during the seventeenth century by Kaspar Jodok von Stockalper (1609–91) for the relief of travellers through the mountains. The hospice, which stands a couple of miles to the south of the pass, was supplanted during the early nineteenth century by a new establishment, built on the orders of Napoleon between 1801 and 1831. For further sketches see folio 5 (D16898).