Grosz painted several butchering scenes between 1930 and 1932. The small series of watercolours and drawings was inspired by Grosz's visit to a country butcher on the Baltic coast in 1930. In a letter of 3 April 1992 Peter M. Grosz draws our attention to three fully realised watercolours from this series which are recorded in the Grosz archive. Variously titled Fleischer (1930), Weg allen Fleischer (1930) and Dorfschlächter (1931) the last of these is very close in composition to the present watercolour. One striking and typically disconcerting difference between these and Die Schlächter is that here Grosz has casually substituted a human being for the side of pork hanging from the butcher's meat-hook.

There is a further pen and ink study of a butcher on the reverse of the present gouache.

Sold with a photo-certificate from Peter M. Grosz dated 3 April 1992, Princeton, N.J.