More Baggage

It's been far too long since my last post so I thought I'd put up a few more photos of different types of baggage.

A while ago I made a version of de Montfort's carriage. At the time I wasn't entirely happy so I thought I'd have another go.

The draught horse is by Donnington. The rider and infantryman are Old Glory. The wheels are from Langley Models, a fantastic source for all sorts of size and type of wheel. Good service too!
For those who like such stuff, the rider bears the Lambton arms - possibly those of Sir John of Lambton Worm fame.

The lower body of the wagon is plastic card. I then bent some florists' wire to shape for tilt supports. I tried tissue but that was too porous. The original pictures also make the upper porion look quite rigid so I used thin card. I wasn't sure whether to have the ends rigid or open but I settled on making curtains out of Green Stuff. I then thought I could take advantage of the curtains and have a go at making a passenger out of Green Stuff too.

I was quite pleased with the result.

EDIT: See Schilling's Berne Chronicle for details of a similar but 15th century cart
http://www.e-codices.unifr.ch/en/list/one/bbb/Mss-hh-I0001 p.405

Some DBMM Medieval armies can have pack horses as baggage elements so I have these from Donnington. The various bits of cargo are separate so can be arranged as you wish.

The wagon behind is also Donnington and again the cargo which comes with it is separate, allowing a variety of loads.

Quite some time ago, I bought some Alain Touller Mongol Baggage. This is a nice little set with a rider, a family on foot and a few Bactrian camels.

The tent is from Baueda.

The pony and camels are pretty small compared to other companies' - not necessarily unrealistically sized but small enough to not mix well. The humans would mix pretty well with Essex and similar sized figures.

More recently, thanks to a post on TMP, I came across QR Miniatures. Most of the range is Renaissance although they also produce some Poles and Eastern Franks from the 11th century which aren't yet on the website.

I ordered some of their horses since a number of DBMM armies have pony herds for their baggage elements. There aren't many suitable horses lacking tack so I jumped at these. I was pleased with them though I'd still buy some shaggy steppe ponies if I could get them.

EDIT: Thanks to Geoff on TMP; another source of ponies are QRF's 'Yellow Ribbon' range. Some have a halter but no saddles or blankets.

Flemish Crossbowmen and Knights

Common to a number of Low Countries cities were the guilds of crossbowmen - the Guild of Saint George. They were separate from the trade guilds and are shown in the Leugemeete fresco. There is still a Guild of St George in Ghent which has a nice bit of background.
 As mentioned in this link as well as various other places such as Verbruggen, de Vigne and de Liebaart, the crossbowmen were accompanied by 'boys' who carried the pavises at a ratio of two crossbowmen to one pavise. The current draft of the DBMM Book 4 list covering the Low Countries actually suggests basing them in this way after a couple of us mentioned it on the DBMMlist.  I suspect that this ratio may have been common in Europe at the time in the period following the adoption of the pavise. David Nicolle's essay on the Genoese at Crecy suggests that the pavises left behind would have been carried by pavise bearers rather than on the back of the crossbowmen as often portrayed following a late 14th century picture.  I don't know of any evidence that the Low Countries bearers had any form of spear - certainly at the various battles where the Fleemish crossbowmen are mentioned they withdraw rather than facing hand to hand combat, suggesting a lack of defensive weaponry.

 I did try out two crossbowmen and one pavise per base but the effect was a bit sparser than I liked. It would really look best, I think, with a deeper base and one firing and one loading crossbowman per pavise. An Impetus or similar sized base would be a good place to do this, or a double depth DBMM base. After a bit of experimentation I decided to have a rank of bases with pavises and another without, giving a ratio of three crossbows per pavise.

 I spent quite a while looking for figures suitable for the pavise bearers. I actually converted a couple of Khurasan's Swiss halberdiers and would have used these but when I ordered some Welsh spearmen (bearer on the right if this picture) from Donnington I thought the pose and clothing would fit quite nicely.

 I hoped to have finished them for Britcon but ran out of time. This was quite good though, since I bought some Donnington peasants and some of those also made good bearers. 

 The figures wearing a hood actually come wielding a polearm in two hands in a sort of baseball pose. I cut off one arm and built another using green stuff in a pose as if the bearer is holding the pavise to his left.

The crossbowmen are mostly Donnington with some Touller figures, including the flag bearers. another factor which influenced my choice of basing was that I had exactly the right number of crossbowmen unpainted to do it this way, as long as I used the standard bearers.


The pavises show a mixture of arms, including those of Bruges, Ypres and Ghent.  The others are those of Guilds of St.George from various cities as well as those of Guilds of St. Sebastian. This was thoeretically a guild of archers although the fresco showed them with the same mix of weapons as other guildsmen. However I used a bit of licence and included some of their shields as I had the details and liked them.

To finish off my pictures of Low Countries figures, here are some knights. First of all mounted:

The general is marked with a flag and represent Jan de Renesse, a nobleman from Holland who led the forces at Kortrijk - possibly he was experienced. For the other knights I used a variety of arms from the Gelre armorial and Rietstaap as well as a book of seals of 13th century Low Countries knights. I wasn't too careful about whether they had fought for or against the French though - time was pressing and the details were sketchy; sometimes I had names but no details of arms. The arms of the burghers or patrician class were even harder to come by for the 14th century. A few are mentioned such as de Conninck's and, for a later period,  van Artevelde's but I couldn't be sure of many others. The regulations have survived which show the expectations of these 'nouveaux riches' as far as equipment goes - the two richest classes were to have armoured horses as well as the rest of the men-at-arms' panoply.
 Some of the Donnington knights come with a bird crest  - I adapted some of these by cutting or adding Green Stuff so a few have the crest shown in the Gelre Armorial. Wearing crests in battle was becoming rarer as the 14th century progressed but I kept a few as traditionalists or show-offs.
The figures come with smaller shields than this but I got some of the slightly larger ones - partly as it made painting easier.

I have already posted some pictures of Old Glory dismounted knights but I also have some more specifically Low Countires ones. They are figures from Mirliton and IMO some of their best. They are actually designed for a period earlier than the mounted men-at-arms which I used but they match the figures on the Kortrijk chest pretty nicely apart from the ailettes. To get the real Low Countries look, I have converted some to carry gepinde stafs (or whatever the plural is!) You can see the unconverted ones alongside the converts. The staves were made from a dressmakers pin with a covering of greeen stuff or Milliput. Once I knew what I was doing they could be made pretty quickly. Note that I also put a Milliput cerveilliere on one of the knights as shown on the Chest. Overall, I think the central figure gives a nice effect of the picture I have linked to before

Comparisons of Knights

Here's a comparison between the knights from various companies.

First, the horses. From the left

Legio Heroica, Essex, Mirliton, Black Hat, Alain Touller.

The Touller horses have been redesigned since I bought mine and I haven't seen them.

Again, from the left

Legio Heroica, Essex, Mirliton, Black Hat, Touller

The Black Hat knights aren't quite as versatile as their infantry, being noticeably smaller than other ranges. The Legio figures are a bit taller but it is their bulk which makes them stand out next to other figures. Their shields are just about identical in size to the ones from Mirliton though a little thicker. The Mirliton figure is one of the later ones in this range. Some of the earlier ones are a little smaller though not so much that it couldn't be natural variation. The Essex figure is one of their Spanish range wearing obsolete gear for the mid- to late-13th century.

From some pictures I've seen elsewhere, the Old Glory 'Crusader' range is a pretty good match for size and build of the Mirliton figures. Most of this range carry heater shields more typical of the mid 13th century than the 3rd Crusade. The ones in the 'Holy Order' range have larger shields which are of an earlier form though still more early 13th than late 12th century. The range seems to have a mix of early 13th century 'face mask' helms and mid century full helms. Both of these were found earlier, but full helms in particular seem to have been extremely uncommon pre-1200 and not predominant for another generation or more. The Old Glory figures also have most of the knights on barded horses which were probably uncommon before 1200.

I've used Mirliton figures for my Italians as well as French and German forces which are in progress. I used Touller figures for the Spanish. My current project is a Feudal English army of roughly the time of Simon de Montfort. I've had the urge for a while to paint a few figures bearing the arms of the nobility who held lands close to where I live. I've found even more information than I hoped and so now I shall do a whole army. About a dozen figures done so far so watch this space.

EDIT: Since writing this, Touller are out of production and unlikely to return, Black Hat/Gladiator/Metal Magic have just gone out of production and Legio Heroica are hard to get if at all.

On the positive side, Donnington have a range of 12th and 13th century figures. Mirliton have a range of  14th century figures, most of which will be suitable for the early part of the century. There are a few companies producing STLs for 3d printing though most are designed for 28mm rather than 15mm. They can be scaled but this can result in very fine detail which is harder to pick out. My favourite range is the March to Hell figures though the 13th century Feudal Europe mounted figures are very short in the leg. 

Figure Comparisons: 15mm Spearmen and Donnington Review

Yesterday I bought some of the 'New Era' figures from Donnington. I'd looked at them before but had assumed that they wouldn't be suitable for the period I wanted. The cavalry are certainly designed for the mid to late 14th century and beyond bit there turned out to be quite a few figures which would be suitable for my period.


The website is pretty good and representative figures are shown although I think there are a couple of misplaced pictures. The useful thing to know for many of us is how well they mix with other brands, particularly if, like me, you are going to get other troop types from different manufacturers.

From the left - Black Hat, Donnington, Mirliton, Touller. I've already based all my Essex and Legio Heroica figures, so they'll have to wait until I do some photos of based figures. The LH figures are a bit taller than the others (as with the crossbowmen). They'll look fine next to other makes but I don't think they'd look right in the same base. I shall keep mine as separate 'units'.

This Touller figure is a bit taller than the others - it isn't just the way his base isn't quite lined up. The other Feudal spearmen I have from Touller are just a bit shorter and are about the same size as Black Hat. I've put a few of these taller figures in with Black Hat figures and they don't stand out. All four companies could mix well although the ones with cast on shields may not look right next to the ones with separate shields.
The Donnington and Mirliton figures are very similar in size and style. Even the bases are similar shapes.

The figures are generally designed with the mid 14th century in mind. This does mean that not all are suitable for the late 13th century - leg armour and helmets in particular. The range includes some plancon bearers for the Low Countries, and these are the best I have seen so far. They are in kettle hat, which is fine for Courtrai/Kortrijk, or in bascinet which is better for the mid 14th century. However, a bit of filing should make a nice cervelliere as worn by the figures in the Kortrijk chest. The shields are separate on these which is useful - depite Heath's illustartion in Armies of the Middle ages, the three primary source pictures I know of which show this weapon show the wielders without shields.

In some cases the only noticeable bit of the leg armour just looks to be knee protectors - poleyns. These could probably be filed off or painted over. This gives then gives a nice range of polearms wielding figures in active poses.
LCF 8, LCF 10 and HYF 20 and probably some others will be particularly useful for 'Auxillia' types - there aren't many figures around which are suitable for these.

I like these figures and will be getting some more. It might even tempt me to do a DBA Low Countries army although this tends to start me on the slippery slope of a full DBMM army. At least Rune has already done the flags!

Update:
Here are some Alain Touller Spanish spearmen:

Only the ones with the mail coif are sold as Spanish and have the distinctive round bottomed shield. The others have a more pointed shield. Since I wanted a bit of variety of headgear but all with the same shield, I used a file to round off the points. It was pretty quick to do this.

Here is a comparison of, from the left, Mirliton, Alain Touller and Legio Heroica:

The Touller figures are more simiar in height to Mirliton than the unpainted example above. The Legio Heroica figures are a bit taller than the others but don't look out of place. 

Spain: Royalty and Flags

This is my 15mm King of Aragon. The figures are Alain Touller with two Mirliton horses.







James I - the Conqueror, was king of Aragon through most of the 13th century. Much of his fighting was against various Muslim states, including the conquest of Mallorca and campaigning in Murcia. His life is covered by a chronicle which he authored (no doubt with the aid of a ghost writer). This is an excellent read. It is available on-line here.







He was succeeded by Peter III - the Great. He fought against rebellions at home and then led an expedition to reinstate Aragonese suzerainty over Tunis. From there, he led his army to Sicily to fight against Charles of Anjou. Peter was given a large sum of money by the Byzantine Emperor to assist this endeavour - Charles had set his sights on taking Constantinople to re-establish the Latin Empire.



At one point the two kings agreed to end the war by a duel in Bordeaux, though only Peter turned up.



The Pope excommunicated Peter for his invasion of Sicily and, declaring him deposed, a Crusade was called. This involved a huge French invasion of Peter's territory. Initially successful, the Crusade collapsed into a rout due to disease and the defeat of the French fleet.



On Peter's death, he left his Spanish possessions to his son Alfonso III and Sicily to another son, James.



Peter and Charles of Anjou are both placed by Dante outside Purgatory, singing in harmony.



Alfonso conquered Mallorca from his uncle (another James) and then Minorca from its Muslim ruler. His six year reign ended with his death at the age of 27. Dante placed him at the foot of the mountain of Purgatory with the inefficient rulers.



James of Sicily inherited the Kingdom of Aragon. In order to achieve peace with the Angevin Charles II, James agreed to give Sicily to Charles. The Sicilians disagreed and made James' brother, Frederick, king. James briefly made war on his brother which largely took the form of naval actions - James was even appointed Captain-General of the Papacy. As a further inducement, James was given Corsica and Sardinia - even though these were not in the Pope's control.

Dante is not complimentary about the Aragonese kings of Sicily

That book will show the greed and cowardice
of him who oversees the Isle of Fire,
on which Anchises ended his long life;


and to make plain his paltriness, the letters
that register his deeds will be contracted,
to note much pettiness in little space.


And all shall see the filthiness of both 
his uncle and his brother, who dishonored
a family so famous—and two crowns.
Paradiso, 19
Ferdinand IV is also criticised in the book of bad deeds, for his "life of treachery and ease."





Various chronicles cover the reigns of Peter and James. The most complete one available in English online was by Muntaner, available here. It is also a valuable source for the Catalan Company which campaigned in Byzantine lands. Others include ones by Desclot and San Juan de la Pena, though I don't know of any complete English versions of these online.













This is my representation of Don Enrique of Castile. Figures are Alain Touller.



He was a younger son of Fernando III of Castile. He fought against his brother, Alfonso X, and although initially successful he was forced into exile in England. After three years he had to leave and went to Aragon. He conquered the small Moorish Kingdom of Niebla but was again induced to leave Spain. He worked as a mercenary for the King of Tunis and then went to Italy.



There seems some disagreement as to whether he joined Charles of Anjou in time for the battle of Benevento. He certainly received the post of Senator of Rome. He considered this insufficient repayment for his support of Charles and joined Conradin's invasion, providing Spanish and Roman forces. He was in the successful van at Tagliocozzo but fled when the apparently victorious army was defeated.



He spent the next 23 years in prison and may have written the poem 'Amadis'.

For wargaming he is a most useful figure, being suitable for Castillian, Aragonese, Hafsid Berber, Medieval German and possibly Charles of Anjou's French armies.



I found his arms using Wikipedia, so I hope they are accurate! I used the same style of arranging the quarters as on this picture of Alfonso X





(Picture from here)
Note the purplish hue to the lions and the cross on Enrique's flag. Even the modern Spanish arms should have a lion in purpure but they are often shown in red. The actual original colour of purpure is debateable and even the above picture probably shows a change due to time. A pruplish red is probably the safest bet, though I've used a more (probably inaccurate) lilac colour on Enrique's flag
I have also painted a Castilian king but the photo is too blurred to use. Another time perhaps!






The following pictures show a variety of types of flags in use by Spanish forces. All are 13th century.










Fresco from here













From a fresco depicting the conquest of Mallorca. The senyera - the Catalan flag - is fairly unusual in that the bars are horizontal on the flag but vertical on shields. This shape is also unusual. A similarly shaped flag from the period still exists in Valencia. The description says that the yellowing is due to age, which seems odd when so many flags are depicted with a yellow field. The conquest pennon has probaly lost a longer tail as on the above picture.
The most common, and traditional, portrayal of the flag is with 4 red pales but as can be seen this was not always adhered to.





A nice picture which not only shows flags and bards of Castilian knights but also some early jinetes. I'm planning to get some suitable figures by Essex at the weekend.

(EDIT: Seems these are actually Muslims who are fighting alongside the Christians - the two were allied at the battle depicted. They may still be a guide to how early jinetes looked if raised from e.g. mozarabs).

Spain

The Iberian peninsula was divided between various kingdoms and other states, some Christian and some Muslim. Through this period there was conflict between most of the states at some time or other.

My initial interest in the Spanish armies was because of the involvement of the King of Aragon in Sicily, a conflict known as the War of the Sicilian Vespers. In brief, once Charles of Anjou defeated Manfred he gained control of the Kingdom of Sicily which included the island and the southern part of Italy as far as the Papal states. He had his eyes set on building a Mediterranean empire - I'll post something about this another time.

Peter III of Aragon had invaded the lands of Tunis to re-establish the suzerainty over Tunis that his father had imposed. While he was there, he was visited by emissaires from Sicily, inviting him to take over the kingdom from Charles. Peter had a claim on the Kingdom of Sicily through his wife and in his own right, and accepted the invitation. There is speculation that the journey to Tunis was actually a smokescreen and that it was only ever intended as a stepping stone to Sicily. The best book I've read on the background is Runciman's "The Sicilian Vespers" though I've included a link to an even older free download book in the sidebar.

The actual number of land battles in this war suitable for a wargame is small - most of the major actions were naval. The final land battle of the war, Falconaria, is perhaps the best for playing.

These are Alain Touller figures (with two Mirliton horses). As far as I know only Touller and Essex do specific Spanish figures. (Edit: Spanish are now also available from Donnington in the New Era range). The features which are particular to Iberian knights are - many of them wear a bowl shaped helmet, often with a face veil of mail; the surcoats have a sort of short sleeve; horse barding often leaves the head and neck bare and the shield has a far more rounded base than the more widely used heater shield. Touller has since redesigned the horses, which I haven't seen. The ones I have are pretty good although there aren't many poses. The great helms of the figures sold as Leonese knight look a bit rounded in places such as the vision slits. This initially put me off them but a very quick bit of work with a knife made them look how I wanted them.
Touller also does some Military Order knights wearing a hooded surcoat - I'll get some pictures of these eventually.


The Spanish nobility seem to have liked showing off their heraldry. Unlike the illustration in the Manesse Codex where most caparisons have a sprinkling of small heraldic devices, Spanish illustrations tend to show the barding with a single large form of the arms in each quarter of the housing. Sometimes the arms are split across front and back, as on the seal of the Kings of Castile and Leon.
These are not figures to paint if you don't want to do the heraldry. Some of these have the arms repeated on - the shield, four quarters of the caparison, each of the sleeves and often on the helmet.


Usually the heraldry aren't on the main body of the surcoat but there are exceptions.

Interestingly, in many of the early pictures showing surcoats from across Europe they don't show the coats of arms, so that probably isn't the original reason for surcoats being adopted.

More Spanish another time, including some of the personalities.

Crossbowmen comparison

Here are some painted 15mm crossbowmen.

The stand on the left is Black Hat and Touller, the next stand is Essex and the stand on the right is Mirliton.

This is a close up of the Black Hat and Touller figures. They mix well, including the crossbows which are different styles in the other makes. The outer two are Black Hat, the centre two are Touller


One of the distinctive features of Italian warfare was the wide use of pavesarii, shield bearers protecting the crossbowmen behind.

These are Mirliton figures. The Mirliton figures with pavise, CO11, are the same as the 'Assorted infantrymen' CO10. I decided to replace these with the ones attacking with lanze longhe - CO12.

The pavises were marked in the colours of their state. http://www.heraldica.org/topics/national/tuscany.htm has some information from Villani. Much of the information is in Italian - unfortunately for me only some of Villani is easily available in an English translation.

Before the Battle of Campaldino, the shortsighted Bishop of Arezzo is said to have asked "Whose walls are those?" receiving the reply that they were the enemies' shields. Dino Compagni's account is here

If you can get access to a copy of Sercambi's illustrations they are chock full of examples of painted pavises. They are from the later 14th century but are still useful. My local university library has a copy.

Incidentally, David Nicolle says that the Genoese at Crecy had spear-carrying pavisarii with them and that it was their pavises which were left with the wagons. His essay is here
I haven't read much about Crecy, so I don't know how secure this idea is.

Figure Comparisons: 15mm Crossbowmen

A lot of threads on various sites ask about comparative sizes of various makes of figures and whether they would work together.
There are some good sites around but I thought I'd do a few comparisons of my own with my narrow focus.
First up are crossbowmen - unpainted to begin with.



Left to right on each row: Black Hat, Alain Touller, Mirliton, Donnington, Legio Heroica

The last two are a bit heftier than the others though part of the LH height is due to the helmet. I have mixed Black Hat and Touller figures on the same stands - and I'm pretty fussy about such things :)
The LH figures are from the Crusades range, representing late 12th century, as I ordered the wrong codes. They'll find a good home somewhere though.

I have some Essex crossbowmen too, though none unpainted. I really like the look of the Vexillia ones though they are designed for a later period so only a few have the right headgear for the period I'm looking for. I shall keep my eye on the Khurasan Swiss range which is in progress to see if crossbowmen are included as these should fit.

I'll try to get some pics of painted crossbowmen figures soon.