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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8

Joseph Mallord William Turner Sketches on the road between Foligno and Trevi; including the Torre di Matigge and the Castle of Sant'Eraclio 1819

Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 34 Verso:
Sketches on the road between Foligno and Trevi; including the Torre di Matigge and the Castle of Sant’Eraclio 1819
D14719
Turner Bequest CLXXVII 34 a
Pencil on white wove paper, 110 x 186 mm
Inscribed by the artist in pencil ‘Fol’ left-hand side and ‘[...] Gothc’ top centre and ‘St Orraclio’ under sketch top right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
At Foligno, the route to Rome joined the Via Flaminia and continued south towards Spoleto. The three sketches on this page chart stages of Turner’s progress between Foligno and the Temple of the Clitumnus near Pissignano. The principal view at the bottom depicts the road leaving Foligno, at a point near the present-day Porta Romana. The town visible on the crest of the hill in the distance on the right is Trevi, with the campanile of the Cathedral of Sant’Emiliano.
The subject of the second sketch in the top right-hand corner is the castle at Sant’Eraclio, a fortification built to guard the Via Flaminia, approximately a mile and a half outside of Foligno. Turner’s idiosyncratic spelling of the place name, ‘St Orraclio’ suggests it was a phonetic attempt to make sense of an unfamiliar Italian word told to him by a native speaker. Finally, the third sketch in the top left-hand corner shows the medieval watchtower at Matigge, a small village approximately four miles south of Foligno. Once again, Trevi is visible in the background beyond.

Nicola Moorby
November 2008

How to cite

Nicola Moorby, ‘Sketches on the road between Foligno and Trevi; including the Torre di Matigge and the Castle of Sant’Eraclio 1819 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, November 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-on-the-road-between-foligno-and-trevi-including-the-r1138882, accessed 19 September 2024.