{
 "schema": "nephos.method.v1",
 "slug": "constable-cloud-stormy-sunset",
 "title": "Constable, Cloud Study: Stormy Sunset",
 "urls": [
  "/studies/constable-cloud-stormy-sunset"
 ],
 "written": {
  "summary": "Nephos reads dark grey-violet clouds breaking around blue gaps and pale gold and pink light as an evening clearing after a storm. This is Nephos’s reading, not a museum statement. The NGA dates the sketch to 1821–1822; no readable date annotation identifies a day or month.",
  "items": [
   {
    "quote": "This oil sketch is not visibly annotated",
    "source": "Philip Conisbee (2000), NGA object record, 1998.20.1.",
    "url": "https://www.nga.gov/artworks/104243-cloud-study-stormy-sunset"
   }
  ]
 },
 "records": [
  {
   "name": "Howard’s daily weather notes, 1821 and 1822",
   "detail": "Main and Tottenham notes screened separately for strong wet weather followed by an explicitly fine evening. Candidate entries are both Tottenham, not Hampstead.",
   "url": "https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.48048"
  },
  {
   "name": "Dated Hampstead letters and sketches",
   "detail": "Rhyne’s published chronology bounds conservative search intervals; Leslie’s edition supplies Constable’s letters. Neither establishes daily presence or this sheet’s date.",
   "url": "https://www.reed.edu/art/rhyne/papers/jc_chronology.pdf"
  },
  {
   "name": "Public Ledger, 9 July 1822",
   "detail": "A contemporary account of the 5 July London storm, read in Howard’s reprint; original newspaper issue not inspected.",
   "url": "https://archive.org/download/in.ernet.dli.2015.48048/page/n93_w2000.jpg"
  },
  {
   "name": "Met Office HadCET daily means",
   "detail": "Each screened interval compared with the same calendar dates in 1991–2020; regional temperature only.",
   "url": "https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/hadobs/hadcet/"
  }
 ],
 "gaps": [
  "The painting has no recovered day or month.",
  "Hampstead residence is not continuously documented; the July candidate has no same-day activity evidence in this set.",
  "One main-register date is ambiguous; unrecorded evening weather stays unknown."
 ],
 "tests": [
  {
   "claim": "Does the visual reading have documentary parallels during the Hampstead seasons?",
   "result": "Yes: 24 October 1821 and 20 July 1822 record heavy weather followed by a fine evening at Tottenham. They are compatible candidates, never proposed painting dates."
  },
  {
   "claim": "How sensitive is the shortlist to the definition?",
   "result": "17 July 1822 adds a rain-to-fine evening if the requirement for explicit strong-weather wording is relaxed."
  },
  {
   "claim": "Do dated sketches identify one of these evenings?",
   "result": "No dated storm sketch in the inspected comparison set falls within seven days of either strict candidate. The other dated sketches distinguish noon clearing, showers and an approaching storm."
  },
  {
   "claim": "How do the screened intervals compare with the modern reference?",
   "result": "Both are cooler in HadCET than their 1991–2020 same-calendar averages. This does not test changes in storm or sunset frequency."
  }
 ],
 "finding": "The painted transition has recorded parallels: two strict candidate evenings and one weaker case. The weather sequence is historically grounded; the painted day remains unknown.",
 "verdicts": [
  {
   "claim": "Heavy weather followed by a fine evening in the screened seasons",
   "verdict": "Partially agrees",
   "reason": "Explicit in Howard’s Tottenham notes; compatible with Nephos’s reading but not observed at the easel."
  },
  {
   "claim": "The painting’s date and particular storm",
   "verdict": "Unknown",
   "reason": "The candidates do not supply independent dating evidence."
  }
 ],
 "limits": [
  "The conservative intervals are 6 July–3 November 1821 and 2 July–7 October 1822, not exact residence dates or an inferred painting season.",
  "Fine evening is a clearing proxy, not a cloud amount or sunset colour measurement.",
  "No station values are pooled. HadCET remains regional; the two historical intervals do not establish a climate trend.",
  "Wet paint and a fingerprint concern making; they do not prove weather was changed."
 ]
}