Inscription by Turner: A Number c.1830
Chalk and pencil on blue wove paper, 137 x 190 mm
Inscribed in white chalk by Turner ‘13’ towards top right
Inscribed in pencil ‘CCLIX 100’ bottom centre
Stamped in black with Turner Bequest monogram over ‘CCLIX 100’ at centre
Inscribed in pencil with several lines of notes bottom right (see main catalogue entry)
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
This is the verso of Tate D24665 (Turner Bequest CCLIX 100). It bears Turner’s prominent ‘13’ in white chalk, but its significance is unclear.
The pencil inscriptions included towards the bottom right of the sheet are extremely faint and largely illegible. Some initials and numbers can be made out, such as ‘AB 51’, ‘39’, ‘EF’ and ‘A.P. What’. Lacking any obvious coherence, it may be assumed that these constitute administrative or logistical notes made by a curator or keeper, most probably Edwin Fagg (hence the initials ‘EF’), an Official Lecturer at Tate, who had supervised immediate restoration work and compiled the damage report relating to the Turner Bequest after the 1928 Tate flood; see Matthew Imms’s detailed account in the technical notes pertaining to the Cornwall and Devon sketchbook (Tate; Turner Bequest CXXV a) in his ‘Tour of the West Country 1811’ section of the present catalogue. One specific page within that sketchbook, the verso of D41303 (CXXV a 27) includes the initials ‘EF’ in comparable handwriting.
Some of the other initials and lettering are reminiscent of John Ruskin’s numbering system for the various wrapped parcels of drawings in the Bequest,
1 and may therefore represent an attempt to cross-reference or interpret this system by Fagg (or perhaps another hand).
