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

Perhaps inscribed ‘Novar Gorge’, this sketch has been identified as likely to depict Black Rock Gorge near Novar House in Evanton. The view is along the gorge with a path or stream (the Big Burn) and the hill of Cnoc Fyrish, with the Fyrish monument on top at the right.1 Turner would have seen the gorge with Hugh Munro, who he visited at Novar House. David Wallace-Hadrill and Janet Carolan have identified further sketches of the gorge, drawn on loose sheets of paper during this tour: Tate D34791, D34792, D34793, D34794 and D34848 (Turner Bequest CCXLIV d 324, 325, 326, 327, 361).2

This is the only sketch that Turner made in this book of the Novar Estate, though there may be sketches of the nearby Cromarty Firth on folios 28 verso and 64 (D27086, D27128).