Joseph Mallord William Turner

With the sketchbook turned horizontally, Turner filled the central strip of this page with a view of the medieval town of Troyes, situated about one hundred miles south-east of Paris. The tower of the cathedral is featured at the centre of the scene rising above the surrounding rooftops. For the watercolour of this town which Turner worked up with a view to engraved reproduction around this time, see Tate D24691 (Turner Bequest CCLIX 126). This led to an engraving in the 1835 volume of Turner’s Annual Tour: Wanderings by the Loire and Seine (1833–5; later reissued as Rivers of France); see Tate T04726. A list of pages in the present volume featuring Troyes is provided in the sketchbook Introduction.