The Company of Death

Military history is full of examples of men swearing to die rather than retreat. A remarkable example in the Classic Grece is the Spartan motto "either with shield or on the shield (you will return)" (greek: E tàn e epì tas), which was spoken by mothers and wifes to their men leaving for war. 

This tradition survived well into medieval times, these groups of knights taking oaths before battle often adopted dreadful names as Company of Death or Knights of Death. In the battle of Legnano (1176 AD) between the imperial army of Frederick Barbarossa and the troops of the Lombard League, a group of Italian knights named themself Company of Death and swore to defend with their lives the symbol of the Lombard League, the Carroccio.

Here I present some figures from a later example, taken from the Battle of Gagliana (1300 AD), fought during the Sicilian Vespers war between the Sicilian army and the Angevin French. A group of French knights formed a Company of Death to avenge their relatives killed at the battle of Falconara the previous year. I hope you will read the complete story, along with a scenario for Lion Rampant in a future issue of Wargame Soldiers and Strategy.

I painted some dismounted French knights for their last stand against the Sicilian army. All figures are from Fireforge Games (the standing figures) and Crusader Miniatures (the two wounded ones). I had a lot of fun painting the flag bearer of the Company of Death. The motto is in Latin "Or die or win" (latin: Aut  Vincere aut Morere") and it is taken from Francesco Petrarca's seventh book of Africa (written between 1339 and 1343 AD).

the first casualty

the painting steps for the flag

flagbearer and captain of the Company of Death

the final group of knights

Lion Rampant - Armies on the cheap #3 Late Middle Ages

After the Hundred Years War, in Western Europe the armies were largely homologate. French kings issued Ordnance to regulate the earlier feudal armies, the first step toward professional armies. The Burgundian duke Charles the Bold, followed this trend. An other factor of uniformity was the availability of large bodies of troops, left unemployed by the end of the war. Some of them became mercenaries, giving birth to the "Free Companies". English longbowmen could so be found all across the continent, together with the Swiss and Flamish pikemen. During this period the transition toward the prominency of infantry in the battlefield is almost concluded, with increasingly larger blocks of pikes opposing the heavy cavarly. Nevertheless the latter still had an importantant role.

In Italy the fighting cities (now became Signorie), massively employed mercenary Condotta, led by Condottiere, usally a minor noble (or not in the line of succession) devoted to warfare to gain glory and wealth. There was a core of heavy and light cavalry, but included also many infantrymen. Sometimes more infantry was provided by the countries who hired them.

The last big conflict of the medieval age were the Wars of the Roses: a dinastic war between Lancaster and York for the throne of England lasting between 1455 and 1487.

We own to this conflict the wealth of 28mm plastic miniatures we can use to represent almost any war in western Europe during the second half of 15th century. This time I'll deal only with one manifacturer: Perry Miniatures. Let's see what their range offers. In Italic the description taken from their website. The boxes cost 20£ each, and can be found here.

Plastic Wars of the Roses Infantry 1450-1500, bows and bills (40 figures). You can build up to 30 bowmen, up to 18 billmen and includes 4 fully armoured command.

The most specific "English" set, especially for the billmen. Anyway, as I stated Longbowmen could be found as mercenaries all across Europe.

'Mercenaries', European Infantry 1450-1500, pikemen, crossbowmen and handgunners (40 figures). You can build up to 12 crossbowmen (with pavises), up to 12 handgunners, up to 18 pikemen (12 of which can be converted to polearms) and includes 4 command figures.

The most useful - generic armies: using this box you can depict almost any infantry for any army of the period.

Mounted Men at Arms 1450-1500
This box contains 12 mounted Men at Arms that can be used for most European armies. There is seperate horse armour for mounts if needed and 7 different horse heads (25 in total). The Men at Arms have 14 right arm options and 12 head options (per 4 riders). There are also lance,sword,mace, warhammer,axe and standard pole/spear options.
Here you must play attention to the heads: there are at least two style of helms: one is well suited for Italian armies, the other for German knights, which include a wealth of mercenaries employed in Bohemia, Hungary, Germany (of course), Baltic states, Transylvania and East Europe in general. They can also be split between Knights and Sergeants, if you decide to place armour only on some horses.
  
Foot Knights 1450-1500
The box contains 38 multi-part plastic figures, 17 flags, unit bases and infomation sheet.
 This box is a little tricky: I don't think many players need so many Foot knights, at least if you're not playing WotR. Especially if you consider Lion Rampant, in which the Foot Men at arms are depicted as units of 6 models. Of course, some could be deployed as particularly armoured billmen, but my suggestion is to split this box between two or three gamers.

Light Cavalry
The box contains 12 plastic horsemen that can be assembled with light lances, crossbows or as mounted archers. It also contains parts for command figures, banners and historical infomation.
It's a very useful box, suitable as Mounted Yeomen or Mounted Sergeants. As the knight box the usefulness is increasesd by the fact exactly that exactly 2 units may be made from this box.

Sprues
Even if the majority of the boxes allows us to make 40 miniatures, where most Lion Rampant armies would need 42 or 48, the Perry twin allow us to buy single sprue from the WotR range (only the infantry commands) allowing us to round up many units.

Luca's Italian Condotta Infantry from European Mercenaries box

Example List

Condottieri
2 Mounted MAA @12 points
1 Foot Sergeants @4 points
2 Foot Crossbowmen @8 points

This list for example needs just two box: European Mercenaries and Mounted Knights. They can represent a fairly generic Italian Condotta.

My Colleoni Mounted  MAA from mounted knights box

Swiss
3 Foot Sergeants @12 points
2 Crossbowmen @8 points
2 Bidowers @4 points

Here you would need 2 European Mercenary boxes.

"Split list" 

Done splitting the boxes between two players.

War of the Roses (or Free Company)

1 Foot MAA/Mounted MAA @ 6points

1 Expert Sergeants @6 points

2 Expert Archers @12 points

If you have a friend and buy 2 Wars of the Roses Infantry and 1 Mounted/Foot Knight boxes, you can each field one of this army.

Alternatively you can field them with one Wars of the Roses Infantry, plus the command tow left over and one single sprue of commands.

German Armies

1 Mounted MAA @ 6 points

1 Mounted Sergeants ± Crossbow @ 4 points 

2 Foot Sergeants @ 8 points

1 Crossbowmen + pavises @ 6 points

Needed: 2 European Mercenaries (1 per player), 1 Mounted Knight, 1 Light Cavalry.

Germany was divided into a number of cities, leagues and feudal entities, often at war between them, against the enemies at the borders as Hungarians, Danish, Burgundians, Flemish (can use the Swiss list), French.


More list will follow...

Lion Rampant - Armies on the cheap #2 Feudal Age

Hi again! This is the second "on the cheap" post. Today I'll focus on the Feudal Age, a period between 1066 and the start of HYW (arbitrary decision).

Plastic brands and boxes

Conquest Games Norman Knights (15 for 20£),  Norman Infantry (44 for 20£) and Medevial Archers (28 for 20£). 

Of course Norman type soldiers represent the "standard" knights for 1000-1100 AD, so they can be used for Imperial Germans and Early Crusader (1st Crusade for sure), just to name two. Both Infantry and Archers offers (especially the latter, they have a good choice of hedgears) a good add on for dark age figure types listed here.

Conquest Games also sells some resin converting kits, heads and shields allowing you to field your Norman Knights as Sicilian Norman or Andalusian Norman. The latter could easily work for early Crusader or Western Byzantine mercenaries. One kit costs 5£ for 6 heads or 6 shields. I think for Sicilian Norman 6 heads + 6 shields could suffice for a conversion.

This producer offers discount on multiple boxes purchase.

Hät Miniatures they are often overlooked, but they produce a small (by any means) range of 28mm labeled miniatures. They are very small, more 25mm, though, so I wouldn't mix them with any other producer. The mounted troops seems to be pretty fair on scale (still both have definitely more human like proportions, so they look "strange"). The details are of lower quality too, still their cost is so low they should be took into account. Their Napoleonic are way better, I have some and I appreciate them. The ranges of our interest are from El Cid Series: Spanish heavy and light infantry, Andalusian and Almoravid heavy and light infantry and cavalry. Spanish command and cavalry are under construction. I won't analyse each box, but the infatry one usually consists of 32 models, the cavalry ones 12 models, both with some variety, but they are casted in one piece (less the weapons and shields for infantry). The cost should be around 13-16€ per box. So if you don't need big deep details to sculpt and are prepared to wait for Spanish Cavalry and have smaller figures with about 40€ you should have plenty of figures for each army. (See my lists below)

Gripping Beast in their plastic range we found three boxes of Arab figures: 

Arab Spearmen and Archers: 40 models (up to 16 archers, 16 javelinemen or 40 spearmen) - 22£

Arab Heavy Cavalry: 12 models - 22£

Arab Light Cavalry: 12 models  - 22 £

These models could go from the Arab invasion to the late crusades, could work as mamelukes against the Ottoman (the Heavy Cavalry) and for the Ottoman itself, the Light Cavalry and the Spearmen and Archers. So 10/10 for usefulness. Maybe they could even represent Andalusians (instead of using Hat models, but I'm not enough into Reconquista Spain for this). The Arab Light Cavalry box allow you to field the models also as Turcoman, I think they could be used until 19th century Turkish army or Russian (Tatars?).

Eccentric miniatures (just for knowledge) have some old school plastic foot knights (16$ for 16 miniatures) and longbowmen (10$ for 8 archers). A lot of pieces for any single soldier. Interestingly they offer separate torsos, legs, weapons, all casted in plastic.

Fireforge Miniatures is the winner brand for Feudal Age, lets see their range (in plastic):

Teutonic and Templar order (specular): they both feature an Infantry and a cavalry box. The first is 24 foot (spearmen and crossbowmen) for 27€, the latter 12 knights for 27€.

Men at Arms: the "generic" western medieval soldiers for 1200-1350 (Communal wars anyone? Later Crusaders). Here you can find Foot Sergeants (awesome mix of 48 crossbowmen and spearmen) for 39€, 24 medieval archers for 27€ and two boxes of knights/sergeants (main difference the horse barded or unbarded).

Mongols see here, useful in a lot of roles, and essential to confront your Teutonic knights.

Russians: the only plastic box is for the infantry: 25 soldiers (mixed weapon, axes, spears, bows, swords) for 27€. Closing an eye could be used as Byzantine in the 11th century. It's a real pity the rest of the range is casted in resin.

Scandinavian: the last release from Fireforge involves these fantastic post Viking Scandinavian Infantry 25 models (as usual spearmen and bowmen can both be built) for the usual 27€. This are armoured models, more suitable to represent Leidang mixed formations of heavy infantry and archers provided by commoners/free farmers to their ruler.

Perry Miniatures they offer a nice HYW range and one from WoTR. I'm going to analyse the latter on a separate post. For HYW there are three boxes(20£ each):

English Army 1415-1429 (36 models, for 12 foot men at arms and 24 longbowmen)

Agincourt French Infantry (36 infantrymen with spears, polexes, swords, crossbows and 6 dismounted knights)

Agincourt Knights (36 dismounted knights/men at arms, 18 English and 18 French, but entirely interchangeable for most Western ountries of the period).

Bear in mind this range is slimmer and a tad smaller than Fireforge range, so I advice caution in mixing infantry from this two manifacturers in the same unit.

Norman

1 Mounted MAA @6 points

1 Mounted Sergeants @4 points

2 Foot Sergeants @8points

1 Archers @4points

1 Bidowers@2 points

Conquest Games, one box per type (knight, infantry and archers) is all you need.3 boxes.

Norman Sicilian

2 Mounted MAA @12 points ->one Conquest Games Norman knight box

2 Yeomen + mixed weapon @10 points -> GB Arab Infantry (Arab Subjects)

1 Bidower @2points -> GB Arab Infantry (Arab Subjects)

+Conquest Games converting heads (5£, if you wish)

Crusaders

2 Mounted MAA @12 points

1 Mounted Sergeants @4points

1 Foot Sergeants @4points

1 Crossbowmen @4 points

Here you can go either with Conquest Games Norman for early Crusader, or with Fireforge for later. Of course Holy Orders are also aivalable.

Arab (Seljuk and Fatimid)

One box per type of GB plastic arab and you can do almost anything :)

El Cid Spanish

1 Mounted MAA @6points

2 Mounted Yeomen+Javelins @6 points (Jinetes)*

2 Foot Sergeants @8points

2 Bidowers @4 points

For the knights and the sergeants use Conquest Normans. The Norman Infantry will provide the heads (attention there are not extra heads in the box!) for converting the GB Arab Light Cavalry into Spanish Jinetes. You need to swap the head with an occidental like one and to replace some shields with adargas (TAG sells packs of 10 for 4£, you need at least 6). For the bidowers use whatever you like, GB dark age with javelins, GB dark age archers, Conquest Medieval Archers. You might also find suitable heads  for Jinetes. I wouldn't bother with Hät Spanish infantry, it's very similar to Conquest Norman and decisively small.

Andalusian

1 Mounted Sergeants* @4 points

2 Mounted Yeomen+javelins @6 points

2 Foot Yeomen @6 points

1 Archers @ 4points

2 Bidowers @6 points 

If you want to give Hät a try, it's the perfect list. Historically they're more accurate than GB.

Otherwise you could use just their cavarly (which is slim, but almost correct sized) and GB Arab infantry.

Berber (Almuravid)

1 Mounted Sergeants* @4 points

1 Mounted Yeomen+javelins @3 points

3 Foot Yeomen @9 points

1 Fierce Foot @4 points

1 Archers @ 4points

Same. I need a brave reader who tries out Hät miniatures and post them here!! (Possibly comparing them to GB infantry).

Communal Italian Army

1 Mounted MAA @6 points

1 Mounted Sergeants@4 points

2 Foot Sergeants @8points

1 Crossbowmen + pavises @6 points

Here you can achieve one army with just two Fireforge Boxes: Sergeants at Arms and Foot Sergeants. With small changes (Mounted Sergeants + crossbows) you can probably represent an Imperial Army as well. 

HYW English

2 Foot MAA @12 points

2 Expert Archers @12 points

This is the famous one box army, can be made using exactly one Perry's English Army box.

HYW French

2 Mounted MAA @ 12points

2 Foot Sergeants @ 8points

1 Crossbowmen @ 4points

Here one Fireforge Mounted Sergeants (barded horses) and one Perry Angicourt French Infantry or Fireforge Sergeants would suffice.

Alternative HYW French (made out of one single Perry Box)

2x Foot Knight @6points

1x Expert Foot Sergeants @6points

1 x Crossbowmen+pavises @6points

...other ideas could be Mongol (from Fireforge boxes), Russian (you lack appropriate cavalry, but you could try converting Conquest Norman with Fireforge Russian bits + dark age archers from GB).

The following lists have been kindly suggested by Dalauppror and offer a different taste of the period and a good way to use the new Fireforge Post Viking Scandinavian Box.

 

Swedish ledung army ca 1100-1250

1 foot men at arms @ 6 points (hird of the leader) 

3 foot serjants with mixed weapons @ 18 points

 Total 42 minis. I.e. exactly 2 boxes of Fireforge Post Viking Scandinavians.

 

Danish ca 1100-1250

The Danish mounted serjants would have crossbow and the Danes would not have as much mixed formations like the Swedes. During this period in the Danish Army there was a great use of German mercenaries.

1 mounted/foot men att arms @ 6 points (knights/noble men) 

1 mounted Sergeants + Crossbowmen @ 4 points (germans) 

1 Crossbowmen @ 4 points (germans) 

1 foot serjants @ 4 points (germans) 

1 foot serjants with mixed weapons @ 6 points ( Danish ledung) 

For German mercenaries Fireforge Men at Arm series boxes should provide suitable models, so you need one Foot Sergeants Box, One Mounted Sergeants and one Post Viking Scandinavian box.