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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1830-35 Annual tourist > Northern Germany, the Elbe and Prague ... > Dresden and Saxon Switzerland Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner View up the Elbe, Probably near Königstein, with One of the Post-Distance Columns 1835

Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘View up the Elbe, Probably near Königstein, with One of the Post-Distance Columns’ 1835
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 23 Verso:
View up the Elbe, Probably near Königstein, with One of the Post-Distance Columns 1835
D30929
Turner Bequest CCCVI 23 a
Pencil on off-white wove paper, 104 x 170 mm
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
Here Turner records the River Elbe in Saxony, probably from a point near the town of Königstein. Figures gather at the water’s edge, and the rear of a carriage can be seen driving down a road. The carriage moves in the direction of a post-distance column (milestone), which is the obelisk at left. Particular to Saxony, these milestones were traditionally carved with distances and journey times to the nearest eighth of an hour.

Alice Rylance-Watson
August 2015

How to cite

Alice Rylance-Watson, ‘View up the Elbe, Probably near Königstein, with One of the Post-Distance Columns 1835 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, August 2015, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, August 2017, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-view-up-the-elbe-probably-near-konigstein-with-one-of-the-r1186801, accessed 26 April 2024.