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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1802-18 Academician and professor > Liber Studiorum notes c.1807-19 > Aesacus and Hesperie Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Studies of a Helmet, a Crossbow and Other Weapons for the Title Page of 'Views in Sussex' c.1819

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Studies of a Helmet, a Crossbow and Other Weapons for the Title Page of 'Views in Sussex'’ c.1819
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 40 Verso:
Studies of a Helmet, a Crossbow and Other Weapons for the Title Page of ‘Views in Sussex’ c.1819
D13813
Turner Bequest CLXIX 40a
Pencil on white wove paper, 119 x 87 mm
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
With the page turned vertically, the sketches comprise a helmet at top left and a crossbow at top right, with a pike, a close-up study of the head of a mace and what appears to be a lance with a spiral design from left to right below. Further drawings down the rather rubbed left-hand edge may show armour. A crossbow with a similar winding mechanism is shown from a different angle in Turner’s 1819 vignette of weaponry for his Views in Sussex. For a fuller discussion see the entry for folio 1 recto (D13751), a page of similar studies; there are further related sketches on folio 39 verso (D13811).

Matthew Imms
September 2013

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘Studies of a Helmet, a Crossbow and Other Weapons for the Title Page of ‘Views in Sussex’ c.1819 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, September 2013, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, September 2014, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-studies-of-a-helmet-a-crossbow-and-other-weapons-for-the-r1147536, accessed 25 April 2024.