This panoramic view of Jedburgh seen from Castle Hill, with the ruined abbey to the right, is amongst the most significant of Girtin’s drawings, providing key documentation for the artist’s first independent sketching tour as well as constituting the first example of his use of an extended, panoramic composition. Moreover, as the pencil drawing is the basis of two major studio watercolours, one dating from around 1797 (TG1229) and other from 1800 (TG1725), careful examination of it and its relationship to the finished works reveals important changes in the artist’s working practice.

To take the issue of dating first, it turns out that the drawing, together with its inscription, is not the straightforward document that earlier writers suggested. Thomas Girtin (1874–1960) and David Loshak, for instance, noted that the trip to the north of England and the Scottish Borders was ‘proved by a pencil drawing … signed Jedburgh Sctod. T. Girtin 1796’ and they interpreted the next part of the inscription, ‘XII’, to mean that the work was produced on ‘Oct. 11’ (Girtin and Loshak, 1954, pp.32 and 157). Susan Morris followed this line, saying that the artist presumably returned ‘home swiftly’ after, ‘before the severe northern winter set in’ (Morris, 1986, p.15). The trouble with this is that the date inscribed is ambiguous at best, and if I did not know that Girtin travelled north in 1796 I am sure I would have read the ‘6’ as a ‘5’. Then there is the ‘XII’, which to my eye looks to be by another hand and bears no relation to the format of the dates that Girtin inscribed on any other drawing. In other words, I think there is no evidence that Girtin’s journey north took place outside the common touring period in the summer months, and, whilst I am sure that the trip did take place in 1796, it may be that the artist inscribed the drawing at a later point, perhaps in the process of selling it to a collector, and he simply misremembered the details of its production. Moreover, this interpretation has been confirmed by the recent discovery of a note from the artist’s brother, John Girtin (1773–1821), which records that on ‘Oct^r 11^th’ he ‘Lent [Girtin] to pay his Rent at M^r Hollands 5. 5.’, which would have required the artist’s presence in London on that date (Chancery, Income and Expenses, 1804).¹

There is no such ambiguity about the drawing’s significance as the first clear example of Girtin adopting a panoramic format when sketching from nature, and, although the addition of more sky and foreground in the first of the studio watercolours he produced around 1797 changes the proportions somewhat, the work still covers almost twice the width of vision of the artist’s standard landscape view. The drawing, amounting to a double-page spread of a sketchbook, was no doubt inspired by the experience of climbing up Castle Hill and seeing the view open out, in contrast to the near views of the abbey, which he took from the terraces below the building. The viewpoint recalls the town prospects – wide-angled views from an elevated position – of an earlier tradition of topographical art, and was therefore well equipped to capture what Girtin’s later patron John Stoddart (1773–1856) described as a scene full of ‘beauty’ and variety, ‘including the vale, with the town, the wandering river, the rising grounds of Stewartfield, and the distant hills’ (Stoddart, 1801, vol.2, p.283).

Perhaps the most intriguing aspect of the drawing actually relates to its later history, because after the artist used it to make the first of his watercolours of the composition, he took it up a second time when executing one of the large groups of drawings he made around 1800 for sale through Samuel William Reynolds (1773–1835), who, in his capacity as the artist’s representative, acted somewhere between an agent and a dealer at this date (TG1725). In contrast to the earlier watercolour, which repeats the full extent of the panoramic view, the later work cuts the composition to the right, thus omitting the abbey ruins, which had hitherto been the main focus. With this in mind, it is clear that the three vertical folds visible in the paper were made by Girtin as a way of trying out two alternatives to the panoramic composition of TG1229. The central fold thus accords with the layout employed in the watercolour dated 1800, whilst the first and third folds, cutting the line of the buildings to the left and excluding all but a part of the nave of the abbey to the right, represent a different way of adapting the composition that did not find favour with the artist.

1797 - 1798

The Village of Jedburgh, with the Abbey Ruins

TG1229

1800

The Village of Jedburgh

TG1725

1800

The Village of Jedburgh

TG1725

1797 - 1798

The Village of Jedburgh, with the Abbey Ruins

TG1229