The inkstand relates to the work produced by the Pall Mall firm of Vulliamy & Son headed by the Royal Clockmaker Benjamin Vulliamy (d. 1811), with his eldest son, Benjamin Lewis (d. 1854) as junior partner. They were primarily known in their role as Royal clockmakers, the family having held the Royal Warrant since the 1740s. However, by the beginning of the nineteenth century, the business encompassed such a full range of activities that B.L. Vulliamy was to earn the epithet 'the Prince's furniture man'. They enjoyed a pre-eminent position in the luxury goods market working for the Royal family as well as the English aristocracy. In addition to clocks, the firm supplied chimney pieces, candelabra and other decorative objects in bronze, ormolu and marble to Carlton House, much of it imported directly from France. They produced designs in the latest Empire or proto-Regency taste, drawing on their extensive library of books on art and architecture, and then made under their careful supervision by the same network of independent specialists which they had built up to manufacture the cases of their ornamental clocks.

The firm supplied an ormolu-mounted lava urn of related stylized design to the Duke of Bedford and thence to his sister-in-law who married the Marquess of Bath (d.1837), by descent until sold from Longleat; Christie's London, 13-14 June 2002, lot 302. Other dolphin-mounted objects attributed to Vulliamy include the four outstanding Chinese porcelain urns from the Duke of Buccleuch (sold Christie's 'Exceptional' sale, 7 July 2011, lot 10). Inkstands were in the repertoire of the firm.