The rare and wondrous fossil-form vermiculé ground on the present sugar-bowl can be found on only a handful of other Sèvres pieces, including a similar pot à sucre at the Art Institute of Chicago (reference no. 1992.633a-b) and a gobelet litron in the Royal Collection of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II (see G. de Bellaigue, French Porcelain in the Collection of Her Majesty the Queen, London, 2009, vol. II, pp. 843-844).

The birds on the present lot, the American Blackbird and the Cravated Blackbird of Cayenne are after an engraving by Martinet after Bouffon. The engraving illustrates both birds on the same branch, whereas the Sèvres artist has separated the two into different panels.

The painter's mark of a capital 'S' is that of Pierre-Antoine Méreaud l'aîné, recorded at Vincennes and later at Sèvres 1754-1791 first as a flower-painter and later as a specialist in patterns and gilding, obviously the hand responsible for the delicate gilding around each fossil.

For further reading on the contemporaneous fascination with earth sciences and Sèvres , see Juliet Carey, The Riches of the Earth, Minerology, Microscopes, and Cailloutè Patterns on Sèvres Porcelain, The French Porcelain Society Journal, Volume V (2015), pp. 117-32.