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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1802-18 Academician and professor > Scotland 1818-20 > Scotch Antiquities Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Linlithgow 1818

Image 1 of 2
Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Linlithgow’ 1818
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 51 Verso:
Linlithgow 1818
D13672
Turner Bequest CLXVII 49a
Pencil on white wove paper, 112 x 186 mm
Inscribed in pencil by Turner ‘Road’ left of centre
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
This sketch is one of several views of Linlithgow Palace and St Michael’s Church from the west (for references see folio 44 verso; D13658; CLXVII 42a). In the foreground is a stream that flows into Linlithgow Loch, with a small arched bridge across it (see folio 50 verso; D13670; CLXVII 48a). Behind the bridge runs a ‘road’ where a figure is driving cattle, and beyond them is the loch.
Turner’s inclusion of cattle in the scene introduces a pastoral theme to his depiction of Linlithgow, which is enhanced by the composition’s foregrounding of the water and trees, over the palace and church, which are relegated to the top-right corner. Turner developed this theme is his watercolour design of Linlithgow Palace, 1821 (Manchester City Galleries) for the Provincial Antiquities, which includes cows grazing in the foreground, with the Palace and church seen beyond the loch.1

Thomas Ardill
March 2008

1
Andrew Wilton, J.M.W. Turner: His Life and Work, Fribourg 1979, p.426 no.1068.

How to cite

Thomas Ardill, ‘Linlithgow 1818 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, March 2008, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, December 2012, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-linlithgow-r1132217, accessed 24 April 2024.