[7] Tiepolo typically made oil sketch modelli with varying degrees of finish to show his composition and, perhaps, submit it for approval to the client.

[11] All three large paintings show the banquet taking place in the open air or in a loggia with a grand architectural setting but with the sky visible, and include a raised terrace closing off the back of the pictorial space.

[6] In the Palazzo Labia the frescoes were designed in conjunction with a scheme of trompe-l'œil architecture by Gerolamo Mengozzi Colonna embracing the whole space.

[12] The episode depicts the spartan Roman warrior represented by Antony being seduced by the sensual opulence of the East, as exemplified by Cleopatra.

It is also not clear whether the fresco is a distant allegory of the movement eastward of the Labia family, originally from Spain,[13] to this mainly Levantine republic.

The Melbourne painting was commissioned for Frederick Augustus III, Elector of Saxony, by his agent Francesco Algarotti.