This view of Sydney Cove is from Fort Macquarie, designed by Government Architect Francis Greenway and situated on Bennelong Point. Rubble was used to provide a base for Fort Macquarie and the rocky outcrop that had been a tidal island, to the east of Sydney Cove, was joined to the mainland in 1818. Now the site of the Sydney Opera House, the point was named for Bennelong, an Eora man, who lived in a house on the point in the 1790s.

This painting is a copy of an FC Terry engraving Sydney Cove from Fort Macquarie which was published in 1855. It is likely that this painting was ‘plagiarised’ by a local Sydney commercial artist in an attempt to make saleable works for the tourist market.