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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1819-29 Italy and after > Second Italian Tour 1828-9 > Viterbo and Ronciglione Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Ronciglione, from the East 1828

Image 1 of 2
Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Ronciglione, from the East’ 1828
Folio 10 Recto:
Ronciglione, from the East 1828
D21783
Turner Bequest CCXXXVI 10
Pencil on white wove paper, 125 x 171 mm
Inscribed in blue ink by John Ruskin ‘10’ top right and ‘173’ bottom right
Stamped in black ‘CCXXXVI 10’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
As identified by the Turner scholars Cecilia Powell and Roland Courtot, this swift study of Ronciglione in Viterbo highlights the town’s dramatic topography.1 The artist’s low viewpoint is from a ravine, looking south-west towards the volcanic rock on which the buildings are perched. Visible towards the left is the seventeenth-century Porta Romana, the main gateway to the town from the south.
This is one of almost a dozen works in the present sketchbook depicting Ronciglione; see under folio 8 recto (D21779) for an extended commentary and a list of relevant works.

Hannah Kaspar
December 2024

1
Powell 1984, p.436; Roland Courtot, ‘12. Vers Rome: “Carnet de Viterbe et Ronciglione” (TB CCXXXVI)’, Carnets de voyage de Turner, accessed 15 July 2024, https://carnetswt.hypotheses.org/2312.

How to cite

Hannah Kaspar, ‘Ronciglione, from the East 1828’, catalogue entry, December 2024, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, February 2025, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/ronciglione-from-the-east-r1210552, accessed 15 April 2025.