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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8

Joseph Mallord William Turner Lecture Diagram: 'Euclid's Elements of Geometry', Plane Trigonometry, Definitions c.1817-28

Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Lecture Diagram: ‘Euclid’s Elements of Geometry’, Plane Trigonometry, Definitions circa 1817–28
D17007
Turner Bequest CXCV 37
Pencil and watercolour on white wove paper, 486 x 696 mm
Watermarked ‘J WHATMAN | TURKEY MILLS | 1817’
Inscribed by Turner in red and black watercolour over pencil with various initial letters within diagram
Inscribed by John Ruskin in red ink ‘37’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
This diagram is based on an illustration from Samuel Cunn’s Euclid’s Elements of Geometry (London 1759, Plane Trigonometry). There are sketches of the diagram in Turner’s lecture notes.1
1
Turner, ‘Royal Academy Lectures’, circa 1807–38, Department of Western Manuscripts, British Library, London, ADD MS 46151 X folio 18.
Technical notes:
Peter Bower states that the sheet is Super Royal size Whatman paper made by Finch and Thomas Robert Hollingworth, at Turkey Mill, Maidstone, Kent.1
1
Notes in Tate catalogue files.
Verso:
Blank, save for an inscription by an unknown hand in pencil ‘20’ bottom left.

Andrea Fredericksen
June 2004

Supported by The Samuel H. Kress Foundation

Revised by David Blayney Brown
January 2012

How to cite

Andrea Fredericksen, ‘Lecture Diagram: ‘Euclid’s Elements of Geometry’, Plane Trigonometry, Definitions c.1817–28 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, June 2004, revised by David Blayney Brown, January 2012, 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-lecture-diagram-euclids-elements-of-geometry-plane-r1136725, accessed 29 March 2024.