A Sèvres topographical plate from the Service des Vues Suisses, 1811

Part of a dessert service purchased by Eugène de Beauharnais from the factory on December 30, 1811.

The service depicts Swiss views taken from Tableaux de la Suisse, ou voyage pittoresque fait dans les XIII cantons du Corps Helvétique by the soldier and historian Béat Fidèle Antoine Jean Dominique de La Tour-Châtillon de Zurlauben (1720 - 1799) in collaboration with Jean-Benjamin de Laborde (1734 - 1794).  It was published in Paris in parts from 1777 with engravings, portraits and maps and was intended to illustrated the strengths of Switzerland, both physical and cultural through its landscape, great writers, scientists and leaders.  It reflected the increasing French influence in Switzerland.  The scene on the present plate after an engraving by François Denis Née from a drawing by Nicolas Pérignon represents the Zurlaubenhof, one of Switzerland's earliest castles and to the author, Béat Zurlauben, would have been of particular interest. 

Eugène Rose de Beauharnais (1781-1824) was the first child and Alexandre François Marie, Vicomte de Beauharnais and Joséphine Tascher de la Pagerie, first wife of Napoleon and was made an official member of the Imperial family in 1804 and a Prince of France. He served as Viceroy of Italy and had a distinguished military career. He was adoption by Napoleon in 1806, and in the same year married Princess Augusta Amalia Ludovika Georgia of Bavaria (1788–1851), eldest daughter of Napoleon's ally, King Maximilian I Joseph of Bavaria, who appointed him Duke of Leuchtenberg and Prince of Eichstätt.