Turner, Wrestling (1810)

Attribution and technical note

A preliminary point of attribution is worth making explicit, since the surname invites confusion. This work is by Charles Turner (1774–1857), the Woodstock-born engraver and printmaker elected Associate Engraver of the Royal Academy in 1828, and not by his more celebrated contemporary J. M. W. Turner. The sheet is held by the Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection (accession B2001.2.1289), and is catalogued as watercolour over etched outline on moderately thick, moderately textured, blued white wove paper.

The medium itself repays attention. An “etched outline” beneath watercolour indicates that the linear armature of the composition — the figures, the architecture, the contours of the crowd — was printed from an etched copper plate, with the colour then applied by hand in transparent washes. This hybrid technique was standard commercial practice in the British sporting and topographical print trade of the period, and it admits two plausible interpretations of the sheet’s function: it may be a coloured proof or modèle prepared as a colourists’ guide for a published edition, or a finished hand-coloured impression intended for sale in its own right. Turner was primarily a reproductive engraver — best known for mezzotints after Reynolds, Raeburn and J. M. W. Turner’s Liber Studiorum — but he also produced and published genre and sporting subjects on his own account, and the present sheet belongs to that strand of his output. The blued white wove paper is consistent with early nineteenth-century English papermaking, in which smalt or other blueing agents were added to counteract the yellowish cast of the stock; its “moderate” thickness and texture are typical of paper chosen to take both an etched impression and wet washes without cockling excessively.

The palette is restrained and characteristic of the period: earth browns, buffs and greys dominate, with the etched line supplying tonal structure and small accents of vermilion, blue and yellow distributed through the crowd to animate the middle distance. The washes are laid broadly and economically, with the paper reserve doing much of the work in the sky and in the wrestlers’ shirts — a print-trade economy of means rather than the layered elaboration of exhibition watercolour.

Iconographic and historical commentary

The subject is a wrestling match at what is evidently a rural fair or revel. Two young men in shirtsleeves, breeches and stockings grapple at the centre of an open ring of trodden ground; one has seized his opponent at the collar and upper arm while driving a bent leg forward between his opponent’s legs — a posture consistent with the close “hitch” and leg-play (the inside lock, or the heave with the toe) recorded in contemporary accounts of English jacket and collar wrestling, though the print is a genre composition and should not be pressed too hard as technical documentation of any single regional style. Notably, both men appear to have stripped to their shirts rather than wearing the loose canvas jacket on which Westcountry grips were formally taken, which counsels caution against reading this as a specifically Cornish or Devonian scene; Turner’s rustic sports subjects were generic English entertainments, and no inscription localises the event.

The date, however, is historically resonant. The years around 1810 mark precisely the revival and commercialisation of ring wrestling in England: spectator numbers in Cornwall and Devon rose from roughly one thousand to four thousand in 1808 and as high as ten thousand in 1809, with newspapers actively promoting the sport’s popularity, and the 1810s revival brought inter-county championship matches conducted under best-of-three rules. Turner’s print thus appears at the very moment wrestling was re-entering fashionable metropolitan consciousness as a picturesque national pastime, and the composition reflects that dual audience: labouring-class competitors and rural spectators observed, at the margins of the ring, by top-hatted gentlemen — one holding a riding whip — whose presence signals the patronage, wagering and social mixing that characterised the sport in this decade. The staging is entirely consonant with the documentary record of matches held on greens and in fields adjoining inns, announced in the provincial press and drawing crowds from surrounding parishes (see, for comparison, the Exeter Flying Post advertisements of 1814–15 for matches “in a Field adjoining the Black Boy Turnpike” and at Hill’s Farm, St Sidwell’s, in the DWS archive).

Expert technical description

The composition is a horizontal genre scene organised in three planes. The foreground is an open, sandy ring framed left and right by standing spectators who function as repoussoir figures: at left, three gentlemen in long coats, top hats and boots, one stout figure leaning on a stick, another holding a long whip whose looped thong describes an elegant arc against the ground; at right, a second knot of five or six men in greatcoats and top hats, seen largely from behind, one with a blue cloak or garment folded over his arm. Between these framing groups, slightly left of true centre, the two wrestlers close in mid-bout, their diagonal, interlocked postures providing the composition’s principal movement. To their right, a further trio of countrymen in lighter smock-like coats and gaiters stand conversing, hands in pockets — competitors, perhaps, awaiting their turn.

The middle ground is a dense, summarily washed crowd encircling the ring, punctuated by figures on horseback and, at far left, spectators ranged along a stone wall with a raised standard or notice-board above them. The background is dominated by a thatched inn with a projecting signboard, a smoking chimney against the sky, canvas booths and tents to its right — the apparatus of a fair — with trees and low outbuildings closing the composition at right. The sky occupies roughly the upper third, worked in loose grey-blue washes over reserved paper.

The etched line is visible throughout as a fine brown contour, most assertive in the foreground figures and progressively lighter in the crowd, where the wash carries the description. Flesh tones, the vermilion of a coat in the left middle distance, and the blues of stockings and neckcloths are the strongest local colours; the general tonality is warm buff. The handling of the principal figures — the taut modelling of the wrestlers’ legs, the individualised physiognomies of the gentlemen at left — is markedly more finished than the shorthand of the crowd, a hierarchy typical of the sporting print.

Accessibility description

A wide watercolour scene of an outdoor wrestling match at a country fair in England, around 1810. In the centre of a bare, sandy clearing, two young men wrestle. Both wear white shirts, knee breeches, pale stockings and black shoes; they grip one another firmly at the collar and shoulders, heads close together, and one has raised his bent leg between his opponent’s legs as he tries to trip and throw him. A large crowd encircles the clearing at a distance, painted softly in muted browns, greys and touches of red and blue.

In the left foreground stand three wealthy-looking gentlemen watching the match: they wear tall black top hats, long tailored coats and riding boots; one is stout and leans on a walking stick, and another holds a long horse whip that trails in a loop on the ground. In the right foreground, a similar group of five or six men in top hats and heavy overcoats is seen mostly from behind; one carries a folded blue cloak over his arm. Between the wrestlers and this right-hand group, three countrymen in plainer, loose coats stand talking with their hands in their pockets, possibly waiting to wrestle next.

Behind the crowd rises a thatched-roofed inn with a hanging signboard and a smoking brick chimney. To its right are white canvas tents and fairground booths thronged with tiny figures; to the left, spectators sit and stand along a low stone wall, with two men on horseback nearby. Bare and leafy trees frame the buildings, and a pale blue-grey sky with soft clouds fills the top third of the picture. The overall colouring is warm and sandy, with fine brown printed outlines visible beneath the transparent washes of paint.

References

1. Jaouen, G., & Nichols, M. B. (2007). Celtic jacket wrestling.
2. Tripp, M. (2009). Persistence of difference: A history of Cornish wrestling (Vols. 1–2) [Doctoral thesis, University of Exeter].
3. Yale Center for British Art. (n.d.). Charles Turner, Wrestling (B2001.2.1289) [Watercolour over etched outline]. Paul Mellon Collection.

“Watercolor over etched outline on moderately thick, moderately textured, blued white, wove paper. height: 29.5 cm (11.6 in); width: 37.5 cm (14.7 in);” This artwork is in the public domain.

B2001.2.1289 (Yale Center for British Art). Credit Line: Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection. Available to view online via Smartify, Yale Center for British Art, and WikiCommons.