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

As noted by the Turner scholars Cecilia Powell and Roland Courtot, this page contains two swift outlines of the Rocca dei Borgia in Nepi.1 Also known variously as the Castello Borgia or Forte dei Borgia, this fortified castle features cylindrical towers at the four corners and forms part of a larger complex on the western side of the town. Constructed in the late fifteenth century by the architect Antonio Sangallo the elder, it was owned by Rodrigo Borgia, later Pope Alessandro VI, and subsequently occupied by his daughter, Lucrezia Borgia.2

The upper sketch offers a more distant view of the western city wall, featuring the keep of the Rocca dei Borgia to the right and the belltower of the Cathedral of Santa Maria Assunta towards the centre. Turner’s viewpoint is facing east. Beneath is a more accurate rendering of the Rocca dei Borgia from closer proximity, which details the individual corbels of two towers and the gateway to the right.

This is one of twenty-one works depicting Nepi in the present sketchbook; for further commentary on Turner’s second visit to the town in 1828, together with a list of relevant works, see under folio 12 verso (D21788).