Louis Jean Desprez here depicts a scene from Jakob De la Gardie’s play Fale Bure, staged at the Royal Dramatic Theatre in 1795. A drama about a knight who gives his life for his king, Erik the Holy, it did badly and was cancelled after a few nights. Still, the set design had all the hallmarks of romantic horror – something of a trademark for Desprez, which led De la Gardie to ask him to decorate a masonic lodge in Kristianstad.