In his letter of 28 June 1764, Leopold writes of engravings of the sights of Paris and London that he collected during the family’s tour to both cities in 1763-1764:
- . . . in due course I shall – God willing – show you some copper engravings not only of these places [in London] but of many other things both in Paris and London. You can then have a fuller explanation of them. I’ve left a number of copper engravings in Paris that are worth 2 louis d’or.
The engravings from Paris are lost. The engravings from London, however, survive (possibly incompletely) in the library of the Salzburg Museum. The original catalogue card reads: 'Copper engravings owned by the Mozarts'. A further note, in a different hand, describes: ‘A number of copper engravings that father Leopold Mozart purchased during his artistic tour in London, Brussels, Paris and Naples in 1763, as well as an English prayer book purchased in London.’ The Brussels, Paris and Rome engravings do not survive; nor does the small prayer book. It is likely that the surviving engravings derive from the estate of Mozart’s sister, Nannerl, whose estate inventory included '28 Italian prospects with glass and frames', 2 Dutch pieces, 12 landscapes, 2 landscapes showing the Tower and Calais, 2 ditto Italian, 3 prospects of the city of London.'[1]
The following images reproduce the Mozarts’ collection of London engravings as they survive at the Salzburg Museum.[2]
The North Prospect of London taken from the Bowling Green at Islington
A View of the New Bridge at Westminster
A View of the late Celebrated Mr. Popes House at Twickenham
A View of the Custom House, and part of the Tower of London
A View of Lord Burlington's House at CHISWICK
A View of St. Mary-le-Bone, from the Bason
A View of Sion House, over against Richmond in SURRY
A View of Richmond Hill from the Earl of Cholmondelly's
Lambeth / The Archbishop of Canterbury's Palace
A View of the Bridge at Walton upon Thames in SURRY, Twenty Miles from LONDON
A View of Fulham Bridge from Putney
The South East Prospect of WESTMINSTER
A View of the Foundling Hospital
A View of the Royal Hospital at Chelsea, & the Rotunda in Ranelagh Gardens
The South West Prospect of London. From Somerset Gardens to the Tower
[1] See Rudoph Angermüller and Gabriele Ramsauer, ‘”du wirst, wenn uns Gott gesund zurückkommen läst, schöne Sachen sehen.” Veduten aus dem Nachlaß Leopold Mozarts in der Graphiksammlung des Salzburger Museums Carolino Augusteum’, Mitteilungen der Internationalen Stiftung Mozarteum 42/1-2 (1994), 1-48; Rudolph Angermüller, ‘Testament, Kodizill, Nachtrag und Sperrelation der Freifrau Maria Anna von Berchtold zu Sonnenburg, geb. Mozart (1751-1829)', Mozart-Jahrbuch 1986, 121.
[2] The images were first published in Rudoph Angermüller and Gabriele Ramsauer, ‘”du wirst, wenn uns Gott gesund zurückkommen läst, schöne Sachen sehen.” Veduten aus dem Nachlaß Leopold Mozarts in der Graphiksammlung des Salzburger Museums Carolino Augusteum’, Mitteilungen der Internationalen Stiftung Mozarteum 42/1-2 (1994), 1-48.