Stiernhielm, born into a mining family in Dalarna, made a career as a civil servant, for which he was ennobled. His long poem Hercules is a pioneering achievement of Swedish poetry. Here, he projects an academic, almost clerical image, but the sword and coat of arms tell us this is a nobleman. The objects at the foot of the column – compasses, cube, sphere, polyhedron and ruler – remind us that learning was a way to get ahead in an estate-based society.