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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8

Joseph Mallord William Turner Burleigh Castle, Milnathort; Loch Leven and the Lomond Hills from Milnathort 1834

Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 5 Recto:
Burleigh Castle, Milnathort; Loch Leven and the Lomond Hills from Milnathort 1834
D26685
Turner Bequest CCLXXII 10a
Pencil on off-white wove paper, 119 x 184 mm
Inscribed in pencil by an unknown hand ‘5’ bottom right
Inscribed in pencil by Edward Croft-Murray ‘5’ top right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
At the bottom left of the page is a small and faint sketch of Burleigh Castle, probably seen from the north rather than from the south-east as Wallace-Hadrill and Carolan have suggested.1 The view is very similar to the sketch on folio 4 verso (D26681; CCLXXII 8), and again one of the farm buildings of Burleigh Steadings can be seen behind the castle to the left. For references to further sketches of the castle see folio 8 (D26695; CCLXXII 16).
Above the sketch of the castle and at the right of the page are two rough sketches that Wallace-Hadrill and Carolan have suggested may be of the shoreline of Loch Leven, about a mile to the south of the castle. The hill in the top sketch is a good match for the profile of Benarty Hill with the southern shore of Loch Leven in front of it. The dark scribble represents the island of St Serf’s. This sketch is a good example of how a seemingly rough and careless sketch by Turner can in fact record topography and other details accurately. The sketch at the right of the page, which was drawn with the book turned to the left, probably depicts the outline of the Lomond Hills to the east.

Thomas Ardill
October 2010

1
Wallace-Hadrill and Carolan 1990, p.20.

How to cite

Thomas Ardill, ‘Burleigh Castle, Milnathort; Loch Leven and the Lomond Hills from Milnathort 1834 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, October 2010, 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-burleigh-castle-milnathort-loch-leven-and-the-lomond-hills-r1136376, accessed 10 May 2024.