Marcel Roethlisberger surmised that this sheet is probably from a sketchbook of nature studies dating to the early 1630s. Leaves from the dismembered sketchbook are found in several collections, with considerable portions preserved in the British Museum and the Royal Library, Windsor. Among the subjects found in the presumed sketchbook are identifiable medieval or antique monuments which Claude likely drew onsite. The coastal town depicted here, however, has not yet been identified.
Numbered in pen and dark brown ink at lower right corner, "25". Inscribed on back of old mount: in pen and brown ink in upper quarter, "A leafe of a Drawing book / of Claude- / Given me by Mr Pond...(illegible"); at lower center in a different brown ink, "1756".
Houlditch, Richard, -1736, former owner.
Pond, Arthur, 1701-1758, former owner.
Churchill, Viscountess, former owner.
Ingram, Bruce Stirling, Sir, 1877-1963, former owner.
Thaw, Eugene Victor, former owner.
Thaw, Clare, former owner.
Thaw Catalogue Raisonné, 2017, no. 234, repr.
Stampfle, Felice, and Cara D. Denison. Drawings from the Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Eugene V. Thaw. New York : Pierpont Morgan Library, 1975, no. 14, repr.
Roethlisberger, Marcel, Claude Lorrain. The Drawings, 1968, no. 36.