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

The page was used horizontally for a view identified by Cecilia Powell,1 looking eastwards from the vicinity of Schloss Ernsthöhe (later Hohenfels), north-west of the centre of Coburg, loosely indicated on the right, towards the hilltop Veste Coburg fortress. For the numerous Coburg views in this sketchbook, see under folio 1 verso (D31278).2

Curiously the drawing, one of several from this direction, was made over a faint and seemingly largely erased page of neatly written notes, inverted relative to the sketchbook’s foliation, of days of the week in French, English and German, accompanied by the specific date ‘17 Sept’;3 see under folio 1 recto (D31277), where ‘Coburg – 17 Sep^r’ is inscribed. The town and its surroundings were amongst the last places recorded in this book (see the Introduction), and perhaps an urgent need for drawing space overrode one of Turner’s sporadic ad hoc attempts at mastering the basics of European languages.