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

This author of the inscription on this page is James Hakewill (1778–1843), part of his advice to Turner on travelling in Italy in preparation for the artist’s first tour of the country in 1819. The text was first transcribed by Finberg,1 and is repeated here with minor variations:

Hakewill’s comments represent suggestions for staying in Rome, including a recommendation to visit ‘Franz’s’, in the Via Condotti. This was the Hotel d’Allemagne, an establishment near the Spanish Steps, which was owned by the family of a Swiss immigrant, Franz Roesler and which was frequently recommended by contemporary guidebooks as one of the best in the city.2 In the early twentieth century Thomas Ashby noted that the family still lived in Rome under the name Roesler Franz,3 and indeed, a descendant was the watercolourist Ettore Roesler Franz (1845–1907), whose paintings famously documented much of the changing topography of the capital.4 Further notes by Hakewill are on folio 14 verso (D13884) but the continuity of the content on this page can be found on folio 15 (D13885). Advice on what to see on Rome can also be found on folios 35 and 35 verso (D13924 and D13926).