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

With the sketchbook turned horizontally, Turner filled much of this page with a view of the fortress of Vincennes which was then located on the easternmost fringes of Paris. The stronghold’s main tower and the royal chapel are recorded in some detail in the top right-hand corner of the page. Turner made several sketches of the Vincennes fortifications in the present volume, a list of which is provided in the sketchbook Introduction. As the site of the notorious execution of one Napoleon’s important opponents, the Duc d’Enghien, this building was of particular interest to the artist as he sought subjects to illustrate a new edition of Walter Scott’s Life of Napoleon Buonaparte (1834–36). These formed the basis for one of the volume’s engraved vignettes; see Tate impression T04973.Art historian Jan Piggott has suggested that the small dark pencil mark on the battlements drawn along the centre of the page represents Savary, Napoleon’s Chief of Police, from which he oversaw the execution.1