J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1802-18 Academician and professor > Tour of Yorkshire 1816 > Yorkshire 2 Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Lancaster: The Old and New Bridges 1816

Image 1 of 2
Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Lancaster: The Old and New Bridges’ 1816
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 76 Recto:
Lancaster: The Old and New Bridges 1816
D11155
Turner Bequest CXLV 76
Pencil on white wove paper, 96 x 154 mm
Inscribed by ?John Ruskin in blue ink ‘76’ bottom right and ‘5’ bottom left, both descending vertically
Stamped in black with Turner Bequest number ‘CXLV 76’ bottom left, descending vertically
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Turner’s viewpoint is from the south bank of the river Lune, recording the remains of the medieval Lancaster bridge and, to the right, the new bridge built in 1788 by Thomas Harrison of Chester. The medieval bridge was subsequently removed but the new Millennium pedestrian bridge has recently reoccupied the approximate site. The present author has dated Turner’s sketches of Lancaster to Thursday 8 August 1816.1
Turner had previously recorded the medieval bridge when it was still entire in 1797 in the Tweed and Lakes sketchbook (Tate D01066; Turner Bequest XXXV 64). This sketch, drawn with the page turned horizontally, is upside-down in relation to the main sequence (see the sketchbook’s Introduction).

David Hill
April 2009

1
See Hill 1984, pp.87–90.

How to cite

David Hill, ‘Lancaster: The Old and New Bridges 1816 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, April 2009, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, March 2023, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-lancaster-the-old-and-new-bridges-r1201741, accessed 08 May 2025.