The present vases are recorded as having been finished 22 February 1830 and are described in Conto-Buch as "For Her Highness the Duchess of Sachsen-Meinigen/2 vases with eagle handles and rectangular colored views framed in raised gold, otherwise also fully gilded and engraved as follows: I. with Berlin and Potsdam; I. [with] Sans=souci with terrace and New Palace" (see Wittwer, op. cit., p. 342).
Johann Eusebius Anton Forst (1783-1866) is recorded as the head of the Veduta department at K.P.M. and the foremost painter in this style from 1823-32. The view of the Neue Palais is taken from August Wilhelm Ferdinand Schirmer's 1822 watercolor and ink original (now in the Schloss Charlottenburg archives) which shows the palace as seen from Klausberg Hill, the highest point of Sanssouci Park, with the river Havel in the distance. For this and for the aquatint after Friedrich Calau upon which the view of Sanssouci Palace is based, see S. Wittwer, op. cit., p. 343.