Scagliola was invented by Guido Fassi (d. 1640) in Carpi, Modena. The basic ingredient is selenite which is heated and mixed with colour, glue and water to become a paste. This paste is poured onto a flat surface in a frame to create the scagliola surfaces. For intarsia panels, the scagliola is carved out and the coloured gesso added. To finish the surface is polished using particular types of stones.

The above chiaroscuro vignette, framed by moluscular-mask spandrels and a ribbon-tied border of Neptune's youthful companions celebrating with hippocampi, depicts amorini hovering above a festive scene of a bacchante and flower-bearing youth celebrating the vintage, attended by a river god and Proserpine in triumphal chariot, symbolising the elements of earth and water. The corner masks are copied from a drawing by Guilio Romano illustrated in S. Massari, Giulio Romano pinxit et delineavit, Rome 1993, p. 119, fig. 117, no. 13.

A related black and white table-top with sea-shell masks to each corner and identical hippocampi, centaurs and putti in the borders, offering flowers, blowing sea-horns, is offered as lot 377 in this sale. Further identical figures feature in the central panel of a table-top sold by The Commissariat of The Holy Land, in these Rooms, 27 March 1986, lot 149.