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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8

Joseph Mallord William Turner Edinburgh from Mill's Mount Battery, Edinburgh Castle 1822

Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 59 Verso:
Edinburgh from Mill’s Mount Battery, Edinburgh Castle 1822
D17610
Turner Bequest CC 59a
Pencil on white wove paper, 114 x 187 mm
Inscribed in pencil by Turner ‘6’ lower centre above the cannon
Blindstamped with the Turner Bequest stamp bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
With the sketchbook inverted is the continuation of a view of Edinburgh from the Mill’s Mount Battery of Edinburgh Castle from folio 60 (D17611). The parapet of the battery runs along the foreground at the bottom of the page, and at the left is the Argyll Battery with its corner turret at the centre of the page (this is seen again in the sketch of the Argyll Battery on folio 60 verso; D17612). Turner’s note, ‘6’, refers to the six 18-pound guns that were installed around 1810 and still stand there today. The mouths of four of the barrels can be seen through the castellations, and another cannon is shown from behind on Mill’s Mount Battery.
The view beyond shows the tenements of Edinburgh’s Old Town at the top of the Lawnmarket with the spire of St Giles’s Cathedral protruding above. The faint profile of Arthur’s Seat can be discerned beyond.
The square shapes at the right of the page may be a continuation of the drawing on folio 60 (D17611).

Thomas Ardill
September 2008

How to cite

Thomas Ardill, ‘Edinburgh from Mill’s Mount Battery, Edinburgh Castle 1822 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, September 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-edinburgh-from-mills-mount-battery-edinburgh-castle-r1132951, accessed 29 March 2024.