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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1787-1801 Student and master > Scotland 1801-10 > Dunbar Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Part of the Ruins of a Castle with the Sea and Rocks Beyond: ?Dirleton 1801

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Part of the Ruins of a Castle with the Sea and Rocks Beyond: ?Dirleton’ 1801
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 52 Recto:
Part of the Ruins of a Castle with the Sea and Rocks Beyond: ?Dirleton 1801
D02684
Turner Bequest LIV 52
Pencil on white wove paper prepared with a mauve-pink ground, 115 x 164 mm
Inscribed by John Ruskin in red ink ‘52’ bottom right
Stamped in black ‘LIV 52’ bottom right
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
This is apparently Dirleton Castle, south-west of North Berwick, built by the Vaux family, who had come to Britain with William the Conqueror. Like its neighbour on this coast, Tantallon Castle (see folios 55 verso–60 recto (D02691–D02700), it was attacked by Cromwell’s forces in 1650 and shortly afterwards slighted and reduced to ruins. From 1663 it was the property of the Nisbet family who were its owners when Turner drew it; their descendants finally gave it to a conservation body, Historic Scotland, in 1923. Another view of the castle is on the verso (D02685).

Andrew Wilton
May 2013

How to cite

Andrew Wilton, ‘Part of the Ruins of a Castle with the Sea and Rocks Beyond: ?Dirleton 1801 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, May 2013, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, April 2016, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-part-of-the-ruins-of-a-castle-with-the-sea-and-rocks-beyond-r1178870, accessed 26 April 2024.