Rousseau was the brother-in-law of Hermann van Swanevelt (1600-55, see RCIN 402637, 402800, 403529 and 404009) and a successful French architectural and decorative painter, who had visited Italy as part of his training and worked at Versailles. As a Huguenot he was driven into exile in England in the 1680s, where he worked for the Duke of Montagu and King William III.

This is one of a set of five landscapes (RCIN 402923, 402925, 402927, 402930, 402933), which now occupy the spaces above the doors in the wood-paneled interiors of the ‘Eating Room' and 'Presence Chamber' of the King's Apartments at Hampton Court, where they were recorded in the reign of Queen Anne. Unfortunately these interiors were completed after Rousseau’s death in 1693 and his canvases have obviously been enlarged to fit spaces other than those for which they were conceived. Furthermore one of the set of five (RCIN 402925) is not by Rousseau but the Flemish artist, Achtschellinck. The original purpose of Rousseau’s four landscapes remains obscure, but they would presumably have been part of some similar interior probably also serving as overdoors.