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

Ian Warrell has identified the steeple on the right as the tower and spire of St Nicholas’s Cathedral, Newcastle1 drawn, like the other somewhat miscellaneous sketches here, with the page turned vertically. The tower is shown from the south along St Nicholas Street, from the vicinity of the medieval Black Gate, seen at the top left from the west. This outer barbican of Newcastle Castle now stands in isolation, separated from the keep of the castle to the south (seen at the top right here) by the railway running into the nearby Central Station. These Newcastle views are likely to have been made on the last stages of the 1831 Scottish tour (see the sketchbook’s Introduction), fitted in around the other drawings on this page; for others of the city, see under folio 8 recto (D22163).

The loose, arched shape at the top may be part of the interior of Chester Cathedral, as shown on folio 35 recto (D22214), or a schematic rendering of the roof of Peak Cavern below Peveril Castle at Castleton, which is seen on adjacent pages. The subject on folio 37 verso (D22219) is positively identified as Peak Cavern by an inscription. Turner’s words below a series of upright forms above the centre here may indicate a ‘rope run’ along the frameworks inside the cavern used in rope-making; see under folio 2 recto (D22153). There appears to be a second cave view below. For other views of the castle, village and cave, see under folio 1 verso (D22152).