By the nineteenth century, exploration of the city’s environs had become as much part of the Roman experience as its architecture and monuments, and Turner made a large number of studies of the landscape north of the city. Many of the views within this sketchbook appear to relate to a single perambulation from Sant’Agnese fuori le mura to Ponte Sant’Angelo, by way of the Ponte Molle (for further information see the sketchbook introduction). The subject of this sketch is the view looking east from a point near the Ponte Molle bridge. The River Tiber stretches across the centre of the composition and snakes its way towards the distant range of mountains. Beside the bank on the far left-hand side is the Torre Lazzaroni, a medieval tower erected over the remains of a Roman tomb.
1 This area of the Roman Campagna was characterised by a number of such towers built for the protection of the city by Leo IV (Pope, 847–855 AD).
2 A more detailed sketch can be seen on folio 27 (
D16442; Turner Bequest CXC 32) and a similar but more panoramic pair of prospects can be found in the
Naples: Rome C. Studies sketchbook (Tate
D16136 and
D16137; Turner Bequest CLXXXVII 48 and 49). Furthermore, the juxtaposition of the Torre Lazzaroni with the Ponte Molle can also be seen in the
St Peter’s sketchbook (see Tate
D16220; CLXXXVIII 37). Like many drawings within this sketchbook, the composition has been executed over a washed grey background. Turner has created areas of pale highlights by lifting or rubbing through to the white paper beneath, principally to delineate the snow on the peaks of the Sabine mountains and the reflection of light on the surface of the river.
