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

Herculaneum, the ancient Roman town buried by volcanic lava during the eruption of Vesuvius in AD 79, was discovered between the modern towns of Resina and Portici in 1709. Despite being identified before Pompeii, the archaeological exploration proceeded at a much slower pace and eighteenth-century activity was limited to underground tunnelling and the removal of objects by mine shafts which were frequently filled in again. Open-air excavations did not commence until 1828. When Turner visited the site in 1819, therefore, there was very little to see apart from a few passages below ground which tourists could only see in the company of a guide. Henry Coxe, for example, described the experience in A Picture of Italy, first published in 1815:

By the early nineteenth century, one of the few public buildings of note to have been discovered was the theatre which lies to the north of the main town.2 Buried under approximately ninety feet of volcanic matter, it had been partially excavated by digging channels into the rock and although its overall structure remained hidden, these openings offered snapshots of the semi-circular design, the tiered seating area, the stage and the orchestra. Turner would have visited these underground chambers by candlelight, and a similar tour was outlined by Sarah Atkins in her book, Relics of Antiquity, exhibited in the Ruins of Pompeii and Herculaneum, first published 1825:

Turner made a series of studies at Herculaneum, see folios 80 verso–87 (D15886–D15898; Turner Bequest CLXXXV 78a–85), and although it is difficult to pinpoint the individual locations, the majority, if not all, represent views of the theatre. The schematic nature of the drawings reflects the experience of sketching in the gloom of the subterranean passages. The location of this sketch can be identified from the Latin inscription, which as Cecilia Powell first noted, came from the theatre.4 Turner has transcribed the text ‘AP. CLAVDIO. CF.PVLCHRO | COS.IMP | HERCVLENSES. POST. MO[RT]’ from a pedestal found at the left (south-west) of the proscenium (stage) which once supported a statue of the consul, Appius Claudius Pulcher who built the theatre.5 As Turner’s study shows, the inscription could be seen in situ within a vaulted space hollowed out from the lava and rubble in which the theatre was buried. The pedestal is the square block at the centre of the composition.6

At the bottom of the page another person has provided an English explanation of the Latin dedication, ‘to Claudius, honourable | Consul, Emperor | the inhabitants of Herculaneum after | his death–’.7 The unknown author of the translation appears to be the same hand as that on a sketch of Virgil’s Tomb at Posillipo, see folio 70 (D15865; Turner Bequest CLXXXV 68).8 A further inscription relating to the theatre at Herculaneum appears on folio 85 verso (D15895; Turner Bequest CLXXXV 83a).