Joseph Saunders, (in Polish Józef Saunders), sometimes also Joseph Sanders (b. 1773 in London – d. 1853 Kremenets), was an engraver, illustrator, publisher and professor of fine art, active in London, Saint Petersburg and Vilnius. He has sometimes become conflated with the London painter and miniaturist, Joseph Saunders (b. ca.1750). Professor Anthony Cross suggests a further confusion with a 'John Saunders', born 1750, who also went to Russia. Career Nothing substantive is currently known about Saunders' early life in London. He appears to have travelled to the Russian Imperial court at the invitation of the Russian ambassador to the Kingdom of Great Britain, Semyon Vorontsov. He arrived in Russia some time between 1794 and 1796 in the footsteps of an earlier English engraver, James Walker already working there, and became "imperial engraver" c. 1802. Saunders was also named "Historical Court Engraver" at the Hermitage. On 18 August 1800, he became a member of the Saint Petersburg Academy of Arts. He was also a member of the Stockholm Arts Academy. He opened his own school of engraving in St. Petersburg. He developed his work as an illustrator to a number of poets. In 1810, on the initiative of Adam Jerzy Czartoryski, he became Professor of Fine Art at Vilnius University in succession to Franciszek Smuglewicz, where he lectured in French on the history of art and English literature. He initiated drawing classes and emphasised the importance of engraving as the most "social" of all the arts. He supported the study of national arts and the conservation of art objects. During his Wilno period he concentrated on teaching and publishing and therefore his output as an engraver was small. It included Minerva and a bust of Jan Jakub Zamoyski, portraits of the Polish–Armenian painter, Jan Rustem, (protégé of Adam Kazimierz Czartoryski) and illustrations for an edition of Tales of One Thousand and One Nights. He published the Magnetic Diary, a collection of his poetry in English, with Polish translation. Saunders joined the Dedicated Lithuanian ("Gorliwy Litwin"), Masonic lodge in Vilnius, whose secretary and friend of Saunders was the literary critic and Polish translator of John Milton, . In a publication celebrating 200 years of art history begun at Wilno University, Jerzy Malinowski has characterised Saunders' academic role as follows: ... Lectures in this field were undertaken only after Smuglewicz died, by his successor to the post of head of the Section of