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 ... > Rotterdam to Venice Sketchbook > Artwork

Joseph Mallord William Turner A Ruined Castle among Mountains ?in the Dolomites 1840

Image 1 of 2
Joseph Mallord William Turner, ‘A Ruined Castle among Mountains ?in the Dolomites’ 1840
Joseph Mallord William Turner 1775–1851
Folio 51 Recto:
A Ruined Castle among Mountains ?in the Dolomites 1840
D32361
Turner Bequest CCCXX 51
Pencil on white wove paper, 89 x 149 mm
Inscribed by John Ruskin in red ink ‘51’ bottom left, descending vertically
Stamped in black ‘CCCXX – 51’ bottom left, descending vertically
 
Accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest 1856
The drawing was made with the page turned horizontally. The scene is dominated by a ruined castle on the rugged skyline; the buildings in the right foreground may be on the outskirts of a town or village.
A long sequence of sketches, mostly characterised as ‘Mountains’ by Finberg (with occasional identifications and transcriptions of the place names marked by the artist), lies between folios 7 recto and 76 recto (D32275–D32411).1 See the sketchbook’s Introduction for the likely overall route between Bregenz and Venice.2

Matthew Imms
September 2018

1
See Finberg 1909, II, pp.1030–2.
2
See also Cecilia Powell, Turner in Germany, exhibition catalogue, Tate Gallery, London 1995, pp.65, 81 note 9.

How to cite

Matthew Imms, ‘A Ruined Castle among Mountains ?in the Dolomites 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-a-ruined-castle-among-mountains-in-the-dolomites-r1196595, accessed 05 April 2026.