Joseph Mallord William Turner

This is the left half of a double-page spread continued to the right on folio 49 (D10957), opposite, recording a view from near Middleham Bridge to the north-west of Middleham. The viewpoint is close to that of the following double-page spread, folios 49 verso–50 (D10959–D10960), but is here looking in the opposite direction west towards Upper Wensleydale.

Turner has also used the top of the page to sketch a detail of the entrance front of Constable Burton Hall, which he annotates ‘Burton Constable’.1 Constable Burton lies about three miles east of Leyburn on the road to Bedale and the sketch was presumably made (filling in a blank space on the page) after those of Middleham as Turner journeyed eastwards towards the Great North Road. Constable Burton Hall was designed by John Carr in 1768 for the Wyville family who have lived on the site since Elizabethan times, and remains their private residence. The house is generally not open to the public, but survives much as Turner drew it, and may be seen from the gardens, which are open to the public from March to September.

For Middleham in this sketchbook see folio 47 verso (D10954).