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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1802-18 Academician and professor > Cheshire, Derbyshire, North Wales ... > Derbyshire Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Inscriptions by Turner 1808

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Inscriptions by Turner’ 1808
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 15 Verso:
Inscriptions by Turner 1808
D07151
Turner Bequest CVI 15a
Inscribed by Turner in ink (see main catalogue entry) on white wove paper, 185 x 108 mm
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Turner’s inscriptions read:
Children picking up Horse Dung, gathering weeds,| Driving Asses with coals. Milk carriers to Manchester.| Yorkshires with Barrels. Pigs. Geese. Asses | Browsing upon Thistles. Asses going to Coal Pits
This vivid word-picture of activity and industry faces a drawing of barges on folio 16 (D07152), and Wilkinson observes these and ‘the mention of milk to Manchester, suggests that we are on the Cheshire bank of the Mersey’. However, adjacent subjects are on the River Trent or the Trent and Mersey Canal south of Derby (folios 14 and 15, D07149, D07150).

David Blayney Brown
July 2010

How to cite

David Blayney Brown, ‘Inscriptions by Turner 1808 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, July 2010, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, December 2012, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-inscriptions-by-turner-r1129577, accessed 24 April 2024.