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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1819-29 Italy and after > First Italian Tour 1819-20 > Albano, Nemi, Rome Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Sketches of Roman Aqueducts: including ?the Arcus Neroniani near the Porta Maggiore 1819

Image 1 of 2
  • Enhanced image
Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Sketches of Roman Aqueducts: including ?the Arcus Neroniani near the Porta Maggiore’ 1819
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 55 Recto:
Sketches of Roman Aqueducts: including ?the Arcus Neroniani near the Porta Maggiore 1819
D15399
Turner Bequest CLXXXII 54
Pencil on white wove paper, 113 x 189 mm
Inscribed by the artist in pencil ‘C[...]’ between upper and lower sketches, left of centre
Inscribed by John Ruskin in blue ink ‘54’ top right and ‘301’ bottom right
Stamped in black ‘CLXXXII 54’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
The subject of the succeeding page within this sketchbook, see folio 55 verso (D15400; Turner Bequest CLXXXII 54a), suggests that these sketches of aqueducts could depict stretches of the Aqua Claudia (Claudian Aqueduct) found near the Porta Maggiore area of the city. In particular, the right-hand side of the sketch at the top where the spaces of the arches alternate between small and wider, and tall and narrow, seem to correspond with a section which still exists, known as the Arcus Neroniani or Caelimontani. This branch of the Aqua Claudia which runs south-west of the Porta Maggiore, also known as Porta Praenestina, towards San Giovanni in Laterano along the present-day via Statilia was built by the emperor Nero to supply water to the Domus Aurea (Golden House) and later altered to reach the Coelian and Aventine Hills.1

Nicola Moorby
May 2008

1
http://it.geocities.com/mp_pollett/roma–aq3.htm, accessed May 2008.

How to cite

Nicola Moorby, ‘Sketches of Roman Aqueducts: including ?the Arcus Neroniani near the Porta Maggiore 1819 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, May 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-sketches-of-roman-aqueducts-including-the-arcus-neroniani-r1132694, accessed 25 April 2024.