A Paris Conservatoire prize certificate, awarded and signed by French opera composer and Conservatoire director Daniel Auber. The recipient was twenty-five-year-old student Mathieu Jacques from Villenouvelle.

Auber served as the director of the Conservatoire from 1842 until 1871. He is credited with expanding and modernizing the school in a number of ways: he was the first to allow applause at the school's concerts, he enlarged the composition, piano, and orchestral instrument departments, and he afforded the faculty more latitude in determining the curriculums. Ever modest, Auber also banned his own works from performance at the Conservatoire for the duration of his tenure.