Vtg Swedish Military Cabinet Card, @1890 -1905 by Hanna Lundborg, Umeå, Sweden
The cabinet-card imprint reads “Hanna Lundborg, Umeå.” Johanna Lovisa “Hanna” Lundborg was born in Stockholm in 1858. She worked in photography before returning to Umeå in 1883, where she took over an existing photographic studio. She died in 1931.
The photograph itself is a genuine Swedish cabinet-card/atelier military portrait from @1890-1905, about 115–125 years old.
This soldier is wearing a light-colored single-breasted tunic with dark standing collar, shoulder straps, six prominent buttons, two breast pockets, riding-style trousers and tall boots. The peaked cap has a dark band and what appears to be a Swedish military cockade/badge. He is holding a long sword or saber in its scabbard. That combination means he could have been an officer, senior NCO, or mounted soldier rather than an ordinary infantry conscript. Swedish officers and certain NCOs in infantry and other branches also carried swords. Given that the photograph was made in Umeå, there is a good possibility that he was associated with Västerbottens regemente (Västerbotten Regiment), I 20, the infantry regiment based in Umeå.
The garden, iron fence and turreted building behind the soldier are almost certainly a painted photographer's studio backdrop, not an actual location. Elaborate scenic backdrops were standard in portrait studios of this period. Lundborg's Umeå studio is known to have used staged outdoor-looking scenery; a Swedish museum describes another Lundborg portrait from the late 1800s with a studio transformed into an outdoor scene using trees and fencing.
On the back is a name, number and price.