Print from a series of a 100 of cities of the world published by Schenk (1660-1711) in Amsterdam in 1702: the previous note of this copy as by his son Pieter the younger is wrong, since he was only born in 1693 (d.1775). Who drew the image is not known since Schenk was an engraver and publisher rather than an original artist (and not a marine one). He also opened a shop in Leipzig and circulated his prints internationally, so they can be found as the basis of pictures by other artists. St John's College, Oxford, has a pair of early 18th century marine oil paintings on panel, both formerly identified as views of Plymouth, of which one has the fort and dockyard of Sheerness as background and the other is a fairly close copy of this print of Messina 'the principal city of Sicily', as described in the Dutch and Latin caption. The main difference is that while Schenk shows two Dutch men of war off the port, the one on the left in the painting is an English one seen from the same viewpoint but with a distinctive English stern, red ensign and slightly different disposition of sails: from the way it is painted it is probably modelled on an example by van de Velde the younger, though the English artist of both the paintings is unidentified. [PvdM 9/21]