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

Turner’s journey to Rome took him to Civita Castellana, a town in the Viterbo province of Lazio, approximately seventeen miles south of Narni and thirty miles north of the capital. This page contains three consecutive sketches which chart the progress of his route clockwise through the town, from the Ponte Clementino on the northern approach, to the south-western gate near the Forte Sangallo. The first sketch, in the top left-hand corner, depicts the road into Civita Castellana near the southern end of the Ponte Clementino, whilst the second, in the bottom left-hand corner records the view looking down the present-day Via Vincenzo Ferretti towards the Church of Santa Maria dell Carmine o dell Arco. A further drawing of the same view can be seen on folio 79 verso (D14808). Finally the third sketch, in the top right-hand corner, shows the road leaving the town with part of the walls of the Forte Sangallo.

There is an additional inverted sketch of this page which relates to the towers of the Rocca dei Borgia in Nepi, a town approximately five miles south-west of Civita Castellana, see folio 80 (D14810).