The Pra della Valle in Padua

It entered the collection of the Milanese nobleman Gian Giacomo Poldi Pezzoli and from there it passed its present owner, the Museo Poldi Pezzoli in Milan.

[1] The first written description of the work was by Emmanuele Antonio Cicogna, who mentioned it as part of Giuseppe Pasquali's collection in Venice.

He also stated it "had been engraved in copperplate by the same artist, but with variations between the painting and the print".

The Royal Library at Windsor Castle houses an etching of the same subject is one of 31 works after Canaletto in the collection of Joseph Smith, British resident in Venice, and two preparatory drawings for the paintings.

[2] The work was initially attributed to Bernardo Bellotto by the Museo Poldi Pezzoli's first Giuseppe Bertini in his 1881 catalogue of the collection,[3] but modern art historians consider it to be similar enough to Canaletto's 1740s works to make a secure attribution to him.