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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1802-18 Academician and professor > West Country 1811 > Devonshire Coast, No.1 Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner The Thames at Runnymede, Looking towards Windsor 1811

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘The Thames at Runnymede, Looking towards Windsor’ 1811
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 11 Verso:
The Thames at Runnymede, Looking towards Windsor 1811
D08382
Turner Bequest CXXIII 11a
Pencil on white wove writing paper, 75 x 117 mm
Inscribed by Turner in pencil ‘W’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
The initial ‘W’ presumably indicates this as a view towards Windsor Castle, about four miles north-west up the Thames from Runnymede, which is opposite Ankerwycke Priory, shown on folio 9 verso and the recto of the present sheet (D08379, D08381). One of the drawings on folio 12 verso (D08384) is inscribed ‘Windsor’ in full. The valley is more wooded today and the castle is obscured from this point. Nearby Egham, mentioned in Turner’s accounts on folio 1 recto (D08362), was at or near the start of his West Country itinerary (see the introduction to the 1811 tour). Runnymede appears in Turner’s poetry on folio 26 recto (D08410), and Windsor on folio 28 verso (D08414).

Matthew Imms
June 2011

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘The Thames at Runnymede, Looking towards Windsor 1811 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, June 2011, 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-the-thames-at-runnymede-looking-towards-windsor-r1136859, accessed 19 April 2024.