Joseph Mallord William Turner

Turner’s viewpoint for this panoramic vista across the Bay of Naples is the so-called Tomb of Virgil on the Posillipo Hill, see folio 70 (D15865; Turner Bequest CLXXXV 68). During the nineteenth century it was one of the most famous prospects in the city and Turner made a number of variant drawings of it during his 1819 sojourn. The view looks east across the semi-circular sweep of the Chiaia waterfront towards the headland of Castel dell’Ovo with Vesuvius rising beyond. Above the city to the left are the Castel Sant’Elmo and the Certosa di San Martino, whilst the building along the ridge of the Vomero Hill to the far left is the seventeenth-century Villa Belvedere. The composition continues on the opposite sheet of the double-page spread, see folio 71 (D15867; Turner Bequest CLXXXV 69).

Related sketches can be found on folios 69–69 verso, 71 verso (D15904–D15905, D15868; Turner Bequest CLXXXV 90–90a, 69a) and in the Naples; Rome C. Studies sketchbook (Tate D16102 and D16143; Turner Bequest CLXXXVII 14 and 55). Compare also a drawing by James Hakewill (1778–1843), Naples and Mount Vesuvius from above Virgil’s Tomb 1816 (British School at Rome Library), reproduced in Hakewill’s Picturesque Tour of Italy (published 1820), a book to which Turner also contributed illustrations.1