Traditionally, the subject of the conflict between cat and dog is based on a painting by the Bohemian artist Johann Wenzel Peter (1745-1829) who worked in Rome and often supplied designs for the micromosaicists. More recently, Jeanette Hannisee Gabriel suggested that he may have been inspired by an earlier work by David de Coninck (1644-1687) but it was certainly a popular subject (J.H.Gabriel, Micromosaics – Private Collections, 2016, p. 153).

Alvar Gonzalez-Palacios quotes a note from the Memoirs of Giuseppe Antonio Guattani who visited the workshop of the mosaicist Filippo Puglieschi in 1805/6. Guattani remarks on a box cover which he found very beautiful, ‘As to that more amusing than frightening war between the dog and the cat, because of its being originally so well conceived and represented by the incomparable Peter, everyone is delighted to see it, as they are to see the Capitoline Doves’ (Exhibition catalogue, The Art of Mosaics, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 1977, p. 77).