James Byam Shaw was the first to point out the existence of two parallel series of large, highly finished drawings by Fontebasso of Biblical and Ancient History subjects, J. Byam Shaw, The Drawings of Francesco Fontebasso, Arte Veneta, VIII, 1954, pp. 317-25. The largest group of these drawings is an album of Biblical subjects in the Correr, T. Pignatti, Disegni Antichi del Museo Correr di Venezia, Venice, 1981, nos. 447-74. Byam Shaw suggested that drawings from these series were early works, but Pignatti argues for a later dating of the 1750s