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

A view of the eastern bank of the River Tiber from one side of the Ponte Rotto (formerly the Pons Aemilius), an ancient ruined stone bridge at the southernmost tip of the Isola Tiberina. Today the bridge has just one isolated arch remaining in the centre of the river, hence its name which literally translates as ‘Broken Bridge’. However, in Turner’s day there were three linked to the western bank and the Trastevere district. For a detailed sketch see folio 53 verso (D16250; Turner Bequest CLXXXVIII 52a).

This section of the river is particularly rich in ancient monuments. Structures visible in Turner’s sketch include (from left to right): the surviving pillars and arches of the Ponte Rotto; a riverside mill and landing beach with a boat in front; the circular Temple of Hercules Victor (sometimes called the Temple of Vesta or the Church of Santa Maria del Sole); the arched mouth of the Cloaca Maxima or Great Sewer beneath; the ruins of the Palatine on the hill beyond; and on the far right the Baroque façade and Romanesque campanile of the Church of Santa Maria in Cosmedin. The view today is significantly changed owing to the construction of the embankment and Lungotevere at the end of the nineteenth century.1 Furthermore, between 1894–99 the eighteenth-century façade of Santa Maria in Cosmedin was stripped back to reveal the medieval front in evidence today.

The view can be compared to a drawing by James Hakewill, Rome. View from the Convent of S. Bartolomeo looking to the Ponte Rotto, the Temple of Vesta etc. c.1817 (British School at Rome Library) which records the same stretch of river from the other side of the Ponte Rotto.2