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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8

Joseph Mallord William Turner View Looking South-West from the Palatine, Rome, with the Ruins of the Palace of Septimius Severus 1819

Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 79 Recto:
View Looking South-West from the Palatine, Rome, with the Ruins of the Palace of Septimius Severus 1819
D15446
Turner Bequest CLXXXII 78
Pencil on white wove paper, 113 x 189 mm
Inscribed by John Ruskin in blue ink ‘78’ bottom left, inverted, and ‘301’ top left, inverted
Stamped in black ‘CLXXXII 78’ top left, inverted
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
The viewpoint for this inverted sketch is similar to that of another view looking south-west from the substructures of the ruined Palace of Septimius Severus on the Palatine Hill, see folio 75 verso (D15440; Turner Bequest CLXXXII 74a). In the distance on the right-hand side can be seen the Porta San Paolo, whilst on the left is the Convent of Santa Balbina on the Aventine Hill.
The composition replicates that of a drawing by James Hakewill, Rome, Ruins of the Palace of the Caesars on the Palatine Hill, later published in a series called Eight Views of Rome, 1823.1

Nicola Moorby
May 2008

1
Tony Cubberley and Luke Herrmann, Twilight of the Grand Tour: A Catalogue of the drawings by James Hakewill in the British School at Rome Library, Rome 1992, no.3.10, p.188 reproduced.

How to cite

Nicola Moorby, ‘View Looking South-West from the Palatine, Rome, with the Ruins of the Palace of Septimius Severus 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-view-looking-south-west-from-the-palatine-rome-with-the-r1132741, accessed 29 March 2024.