Hamo Thornycroft's Mower was first exhibited in plaster at the Royal Academy in 1884, and a bronze version in 1894. The genesis of this composition lay in a boat trip of 1882, when Hamo observed a mower resting on the banks of the River Thames, he made study drawings and later sketch models in wax and plaster. The Italian Orazio Cervi posed for the model in 1883, and when the completed figure was exhibited it was accompanied by lines from the poem Thyrsis by Matthew Arnold. Like the poem, with the Mower Hamo created an idyll to the pensive and natural energy in man. In this respect, his Mower follows closely in the tradition of Donatello's bronze David and Gilbert's bronze Perseus, each expressing through stillness and melancholy the latent physical strength. Hamo also found inspiration in the paintings of Millet and sculpture of Meunier, but unlike these his figure is not a social statement, but rather the abstraction of the physical into the heroic and solitary.
In 1890 Hamo issued a circular to announce the limited edition in bronze of the Mower, approximately 25 and each costing 45 guineas and probably cast by Singer and Sons of Frome. The present example, originally a gift from the sculptor, reflects both the strength of modelling and fine finish of this limited edition.