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

ISBN 978-1-84976-386-8
J.M.W. Turner > 1836-47 Modern painter > Venice, Austria and Southern Germany ... > Venice; Passau to Würzburg Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Regensburg across the River Danube, with the Steinerne Brücke and Cathedral; the River Main near Ebing, with Hills and Towers 1840

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Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Regensburg across the River Danube, with the Steinerne Brücke and Cathedral; the River Main near Ebing, with Hills and Towers’ 1840
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 44 Verso:
Regensburg across the River Danube, with the Steinerne Brücke and Cathedral; the River Main near Ebing, with Hills and Towers 1840
D31363
Turner Bequest CCCX 44a
Pencil on cream wove paper, 126 x 198 mm
Partial watermark ‘atman’
Inscribed by Turner in pencil ‘Ferry over the Main [?btwn] Bam and Coburg’ above centre
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
There are two unrelated subjects here, both drawn with the page turned horizontally. As recognised by Cecilia Powell,1 in the lower half (towards the outer edge) is a view south from just west of the long Steinerne Brücke over the River Danube, with the cathedral rising not far beyond the bridge; it then lacked the upper stages and spires of its west towers. This is one of a short sequence of the city seen from various angles around the north end of the bridge; see also folios 42 verso, 43 verso and 45 verso (D31359, D31361, D31365). For numerous other contemporary views of the city in this sketchbook and elsewhere, see under folio 18 verso (D31311).2
In the space towards the gutter, Turner subsequently added a view of another river, compensating for its less conspicuous landmarks with a detailed note of its central incident, the passage of a ‘Ferry over the Main [?btwn] Bam[berg] and Coburg’. Powell has identified the setting as Ebing,3 on the river near Rattelsdorf, north of Bamberg; see also a slighter view in the vicinity on folio 32 recto (D31338). For Bamberg and Coburg, on the route north-west from Regensburg, see respectively under folios 19 recto and 1 verso (D31312, D31278).

Matthew Imms
September 2018

1
See Powell 1995, p.243.
2
See also ibid., pp.69, 81 note 45.
3
See ibid., p.243, and also pp.71, 82 note 60.

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘Regensburg across the River Danube, with the Steinerne Brücke and Cathedral; the River Main near Ebing, with Hills and Towers 1840 by Joseph Mallord William Turner’, catalogue entry, September 2018, in David Blayney Brown (ed.), J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, Tate Research Publication, December 2019, https://www.tate.org.uk/art/research-publications/jmw-turner/joseph-mallord-william-turner-regensburg-across-the-river-danube-with-the-steinerne-brucke-r1196151, accessed 25 April 2024.