1775 Born in Covent Garden, London, the son of a barber and wig-maker.
1789 He is admitted to the Royal Academy Schools.
1790 At the age of fifteen he exhibits a watercolour at the RA.
1796 He is elected as an Associate Member of the Royal Academy.
1799 Rents a house in Harley St which he later buys. He installs his mistress, probably Hannah Danby, nearby.
1800 Turner’s mother is committed to the Royal Bethlehem Hospital as a result of her insanity.
1802 Becomes a full Royal Academician at the age of 26. After the Treaty of Amiens, Turner makes his first visit to continental Europe, visiting Paris then Switzerland.
1804 Turner opens his own gallery in Harley St. His mother dies.
1807 Elected Professor of Perspective at the Royal Academy.
1808 Tours the north of England, which he visits many times over next two decades.
1811 Tours the west of England.
1813 Moves to Solus Lodge, Twickenham, probably built to his own design.
1817 Travels to the battlefield of Waterloo and then to Germany where he sketches in the Rhine gorge before returning to the Low Countries.
1819 Tours Italy, visiting Venice, Rome and Naples.
1821 Tours northern France.
1825 Revisits the Rhineland.
1827–37 Spends much time at Petworth, the home of Lord Egremont, who provides him with a studio.
1828 Returns to Italy and sets up a studio in Rome. His work was not well received.
1829 Turner’s father, who had been his constant companion, dies.
1835 Visits Copenhagen, Berlin, Dresden and Vienna.
1843 The first volume of Modern Painters by John Ruskin appears, much of it devoted to an impassioned defence of Turner who had been the subject of attacks from a conservative faction at the Royal Academy.
1841–4 Visits Switzerland each year basing himself in Lucerne.
1845 Turner’s health is deteriorating.
1846 Turner acquires a small house in Chelsea for Mrs Sophia Booth with whom he had frequently stayed on visits to Margate.
1851 Dies in December at Chelsea in west London.
1796 Fishermen at Sea, London, Tate
1796 Christ Church from near Carfax, Ottawa, National Gallery of Canada
1798 Morning among the Coniston Fells, Cumberland, London, Tate
1799 Self Portrait, London, National Gallery
1801 Dutch Boats in a Gale, London, National Gallery
1803 Calais Pier: An English Packet Arriving, London, National Gallery
1803 The Festival upon the Opening of the Vintage at Macon, Sheffield City Art Galleries
1807 Linlithgow Palace, Liverpool, Walker Art Gallery
c1809 The Sun rising through Vapour, Birmingham, Barber Institute of Fine Arts
1812 Snowstorm: Hannibal and his Army Crossing the Alps, London, Tate
1813 Frosty Morning, London, Tate
1815 Dido Building Carthage, London, National Gallery
1815 Crossing the Brook, London, Tate
1817 The Decline of the Cartheginian Empire, London, Tate
1819 England: Richmond Hill, on the Prince Regent’s Birthday, London, Tate
1820 Rome from the Vatican. Raffaelle, Accompanied by La Fornarina, Preparing for the Decoration of the Loggia, London, Tate
1823 The Bay of Baiae with Apollo and the Sibyl, London, Tate
1825 Harbour of Dieppe, New York, Frick Collection
1826 Cologne: The Arrival of a Packet Boat: Evening, New York, Frick Collection
1826 Mortlake Terrace: Early Summer Morning, New York, Frick Collection
c1828 Petworth Park: Tillington Church in the Distance, London, Tate
1828 Regulus, London, Tate
1829 Ulysses Deriding Polyphemus, London, National Gallery
1834 Wreckers - Coast of Northumberland, with a Steam-Boat Assisting a Ship off Shore, New Haven, Yale Center for British Art
1835 The Burning of the House of Lords and Commons, 16th October 1834, Philadelphia, Museum of Art
c1835 Venice, from the Porch of the Madonna della Salute, New York, Metropolitan Museum
1839 Fighting Temeraire tugged to her Last Berth to be Broken up, London, National Gallery
1840 The Slave Ship: Slavers throwing overboard the Dead and Dying, Boston, Museum of Fine Arts
c1840 The Falls of the Clyde, Port Sunlight, Lady Lever Art Gallery
1830–40 The Evening Star , London, National Gallery
1842 War: the Exile and the Rock Limpet, London, Tate
1842 Peace - Burial at Sea, London, Tate
1844 Rain, Steam and Speed - The Great Western Railway, London, National Gallery
1845 Norham Castle, Sunrise, London, Tate
c1845 Sunrise and Sea Monsters, London, Tate
1846 The Angel Standing in the Sun, London, Tate