Gustaf Mauritz Armfelt, courtier and protégé of Gustav III, here wears a Scythian costume. Such theatrical dress became popular after Gluck’s Iphigenia in Tauris was first preformed in Paris in 1779. Four years later it was staged in Stockholm. Armfelt was famed for his fine, androgynous face, but his body was more like that of an elephant, according to duchess Hedvig Elisabeth Charlotta. Armfelt guarded artist’s interests at court.