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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1830-35 Annual tourist > Scotland 1831 > Inverness Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Ruins of Elgin Cathedral from the South-East 1831

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Ruins of Elgin Cathedral from the South-East’ 1831
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 131 Verso:
Ruins of Elgin Cathedral from the South-East 1831
D27202
Turner Bequest CCLXXVII 131a
Pencil on off-white wove paper, 163 x 104 mm
Inscribed in pencil by Turner ‘sa’ lower right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
These two sketches of Elgin Cathedral are both from the south-east. In the upper sketch only the towers at the western end of the cathedral can be seen, the eastern end being obscured by trees. In the foreground is the two-arched bridge over the River Lossie.
The sketch at the bottom of the page brings us closer to the cathedral and includes Lossie Bridge again, this time at the right of the sketch. At the left is Pans Port, the only remaining one of the four arched access gates through the original precinct wall. As David Wallace-Hadrill has pointed out, the crow-stepped gables over the arch were added after Turner drew it in 1831.1 Wallace-Hadrill has read the inscription below this sketch as ‘Lo’, presumably as part of the word ‘Lossie’ referring to the river. Another possibility is ‘Sa’ or ‘San’, part of the word ‘sand’ referring to the banks of the river.
There is another sketch of Lossie Bridge on folio 132 (D27203). See folio 139 (D27215) for references to further sketches of Elgin Cathedral.

Thomas Ardill
May 2010

1
David Wallace-Hadrill and Janet Carolan, ‘Sketchbook CCLXXVII Inverness’, [circa 1991], Tate catalogue files, [unpaginated].

How to cite

Thomas Ardill, ‘Ruins of Elgin Cathedral from the South-East 1831 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, May 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-ruins-of-elgin-cathedral-from-the-south-east-r1135568, accessed 27 April 2024.