A view on the River Rhine at Oberwesel, with the ruins of Schloss Schönburg on a cliff to the right, Schloss Gutenfels and the Pfalz to the left and the town of Kaub beyond

Closely related to a small number of drawings by Goll which were made during a trip along the Rhine between Cologne and Frankfurt. Similar drawings are in a Dutch private collection and in the Teyler Museum, Haarlem, while two views of the area near Frankfurt are in the Rijksprentenkabinet, Amsterdam (J. Polak, J. Peeters, Is getekend, J. Goll van Franckenstein, tekeningen van een 18de eeuwse kunstenaar, exhibition catalogue, Velsen, 1997, pp. 87-91, nos. 45-47, and 48-49, respectively).

Born in Frankfurt, Johan Goll I (1722-1785) was a Dutch banker who later took the name Goll van Franckenstein after his ennoblement by the Empress Maria Theresa in 1766. He amassed a renowned collection of paintings and drawings, including the collection of drawings belonging to Valerius Röver, which he made available for public view. Goll himself drew landscapes and was a friend of Jacob Cats, and was artistic adviser to Caroline Louise, Margravine of Baden-Durlach. Goll went blind in the last years of his life.

Schloss Schönburg was destroyed in 1689 and later restored. The towers on the right are those of the Church of St. Martin and its Wernerkapelle at Oberwesel, dating from circa 1300. Gutenfels castle was ruined in the 19th Century and rebuilt in 1886.