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 ... > Würzburg, Rhine and Ostend Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner Burg Maus, Looking up the River Rhine 1840

Image 1 of 2
Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘Burg Maus, Looking up the River Rhine’ 1840
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 47 Recto:
Burg Maus, Looking up the River Rhine 1840
D30548
Turner Bequest CCCIII 46
Pencil on flecked pale blue laid paper, 104 x 170 mm
Partial watermark: Tree of Liberty
Inscribed by John Ruskin in red ink ‘46’ top right, ascending vertically
Stamped in black ‘CCCIII – 46’ top right, ascending vertically
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
The drawing was made with the page turned horizontally. As identified by Cecilia Powell,1 it shows the ruins of Burg Maus, since restored, high on the skyline above Wellmich on the east bank of the Rhine, looking south-east up the river. The vertical feature on the further hillside may be Burg Katz, on the same side near Sankt Goarhausen; see folio 50 verso (D30555; Turner Bequest CCCIII 49a).
Powell has noted that Turner neared the end of this tour following ‘the familiar route of the Rhine between Mainz and Cologne. He almost certainly travelled by steamer, ... sketching most of the well-known sights perfunctorily as he passed.’2 Given that this sketchbook was used in reverse of its subsequent foliation, she has specified the overall range of this phase as ‘TB CCCIII 68v–20v; 11r’,3 indicating folios 12 recto and 21 verso–69 verso (D30479, D30497–D30592; Turner Bequest CCCIII 20a–68a); see this book’s Introduction for the full itinerary of this part of the journey.
Burg Maus is also shown on folios 47 verso–48 verso (D30549–D30551; CCCIII 46a, 47, 47a). For other views, see the 1817 Waterloo and Rhine and Rhine sketchbooks (respectively Tate D12817–D12819; Turner Bequest CLX 60–61; D12918–D12919, D12930–D12932, D12962–D12964; CLXI 21a, 22, 26c, 27, 27a, 43–44), the 1833 Brussels up to Mannheim – Rhine sketchbook (D29689, D29714–D29715; CCXCVI 48, 61, 61a), the 1839 Trèves to Cochem and Coblenz to Mayence sketchbook (D28455, D28512; CCXC 53, 80a), and the 1844 Rhine and Rhine Castles sketchbook (D35185, D35211, D35213, D35215; CCCLI 8a, 21a, 22a, 23a). A watercolour of about 1844 shows Wellmich and Burg Maus on the Rhine, with a pencil study of Bacharach on the verso (National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin).4
1
Powell 1995, p.246.
2
Ibid., p.72.
3
Ibid., p.82 note 70.
4
Andrew Wilton, J.M.W. Turner: His Life and Work, Fribourg 1979, p.461 no.1343, as ‘Landscape on the Moselle or Rhine’, ?1844, reproduced.
Technical notes:
There is a dark, adventitious smudge towards the bottom right.

Matthew Imms
September 2018

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘Burg Maus, Looking up the River Rhine 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-burg-maus-looking-up-the-river-rhine-r1196305, accessed 25 April 2024.