Monkeys were humorous figures in the mid 18th century rococo design vocabulary. A large band of monkey minstrels in human dress had been made at Meissen in 1747 and adapted at Chelsea in the 1750s. The monkeys on the Bow sweetmeats may have been intended to satirize human figures produced by other factories, both English and German. They are attired in the same colorful clothing and assume the same theatrical, twisting poses as their human counterparts. The elaborate scrolls forming the sweetmeat dishes are accented in puce, which was also used to highlight the characteristic scrolled feet on the bases of the figures. The substantial weight of the sweetmeat figures belies their intricate and delicate modeling.