David Roberts, R.A.

Lord Francis Egerton, later 1^st Earl of Ellesmere (1800-1857), purchased from the artist,

The Ellesmere Sale, London, Christie's, 2 April 1870, lot 27; bt Vokins,

with J. & W. Vokins, London;

Captain Eric Heatley Noble of Park Place, near Henley and then later Harpsden Court, Henley-on-Thames, by 1945;

sale, Oxford, Mallams, 28 October 1983, unknown lot number, bt Leger,

with The Leger Galleries, London, from whom acquired in 1984 by Agnew's on behalf of the parents of the present owners. 

Lithographed:

by Louis Haghe for The Holy Land, London 1842, vol. I, pl. 28 & 1855, vol. I, pl. 28 (as General View of Nazareth)

London, The Leger Galleries, English Watercolours, Annual Exhibition, 1984, no. 29;

Oxford, The Ashmolean Museum of Art and Archaeology, on long-term loan, 2015 - 2021  

G. Norman, ‘Treasures from the Orientalists’, The Times, 29 October 1983

In this watercolour, which was lithographed for The Holy Land series, Roberts allows a herdsman and his goats to lead the eye towards the town of Nazareth. On the plains below, Roberts’s camp can be seen, laid out in the same manner as seen in his view of Jericho (see lot 314). The ‘pencil’ minaret, seen in the middle of the town, is that of the White Mosque which was built between 1785 and 1812.

Previous travellers to the region had praised the beauty of Nazareth’s location. Robert Richardson, who was there in the late 1810s, described it as ‘the loveliest spot in Palestine…. it is as if fifteen mountains met to form an enclosure… they rise round it like the edge of a shell, to guard it from intrusion. It is a rich and beautiful field in the midst of barren hills; it abounds in fig-trees, small gardens and hedges of the prickly pear, and the dense rich grass affords an abundant pasture.’¹

This work has a long and fine provenance. It was one of those acquired directly from the artist by Lord Egerton and that later entered the collection of Captain Eric Heatley Noble (see lots 301 and 309 for more information on these collectors). 

^1. R. Richardson, Travels along the Mediterranean, London 1822, p. 434