Nevers had been an important centre for glass production from the sixteenth century, when the Gonzaga Dukes of Mantua had imported Italian glassworkers into the dukedom of Nevers, another of the Gonzaga possessions, see E. Dillon, Glass, p. 232. The city's reputation grew in the seventeenth century to the extent that it was known by Corneille as the "petit Murane de Venise". Its earlier repertoire emphasized figural series, such as the Four Seasons or the Gods of Olympus (J. Barrelet, La Verrerie en France, p. 118); however this was later expanded to include group scenes, both religious and secular. The present group, with its typically eighteenth century emphasis on rural pleasures, is an excellent example of the latter.