Serbian Greek Skirmisher Infantry

Serbian Empire Skirmishers

The Serbian Empire gets the option to take lots of archers from many different national origins including Bosnians, Moravians, Serbians and Greeks. I wanted to add a little bit of variety to the army so decided to create the minimum number of Irr Ps O Archers the list requires using the Essex XMED8 Generic Eastern European Greek Archers. The castings come in two poses and are in the usual Essex style and had minimal flash. I could not find a painting reference so used the Essex website image as a guide. 

The bases are in my usual style on magnetic based MDF with Vallejo Earth Brown Sandy Paste, loose gravel and tufts and edged in Burnt Umber. I took me longer than anticipated to complete these 24 figures because I am painting another 36 castings to model the 12 bases of Krayishnici auxilia at the same time.

Essex XMED Generic Eastern European Greek Archers

This now brings the painting tally from 1st January to 5th August 2021 to:

455 foot, 10 artillery & 4 war drums [130 elements]

188 cavalry [61 elements]

12 Bamboo & Paper Lions [8 elements]

3 elephants [3 elements]

Plus I have rebased

32 elements of Pikes

28 elements of Archers

10 elements of Psiloi

8 elements of Horde

3 elements of misc foot

50 mounted elements

Ebay Bargain of Hellenistic Greek Pikes and Spears

15mm Hellenistic Greek Heavy Infantry For a Song

Just before Xmas 2020 I saw a job lot of 32 elements of Greek Pikemen on Ebay. That's 128 figures and I put in a speculative bid not really expecting to win. I did win them though and ended up paying a total of £55-10 including delivery for what turned out to be quite reasonably painted Ancient Greek infantry. This was less that the cost of the bare metal if purchased new. When they arrived I saw that there were 20 pikes and spears missing and the basing was very old fashioned. 

So I knew that I would have to remove them from their bases, clean off the old basing and repair all the broken weapons. This took quite a while and I had to sort out the various painted groups and repaint a few shields to match to create uniform pike blocks. 16 of the infantry turned out to be spearmen as seen on the far right of the picture above.

I finally completed all the new bases yesterday and spray sealed them this morning. All in all I am very pleased with the results. I can either keep them of sell them off to at least double my money now they are refurbished.

Essex MPA17 Macedonian: Hippakontistai Light Cavalry from Project Lead Mountain

Macedonians - When Whats On The Packet Is Only A Guide

I found a bag of 30 Essex MPA17 Macedonian: Hippakontistai Light Cavalry from Project Lead Mountain. I finally got around to painting them up. I dont even know how I got them except probably part of a grab bag of cheap figures from years ago?

Officially they are supposed to be Macedonian but in reality they were hired in troops from Northern Afghanistan to help out with Alexanders shortage of light cavalry as he moved further into India.

The castings are Bactrian type javelin armed light cavalry and will do for a number of armies, mine will be going into my Greco-Bactrian army. I had 30 castings and only needed 24 so 6 will be sold on as surplus to requirements in due course. Other suggested uses are for Parthians, Seleucids and other Early Successors. Maccabeans, Sogdians, Hyrcanians, Persians, Indians and Arachosians. 

Being Essex they are of course single pose castings and are all riding the same horse castings because these are one of their older ranges. The painted up really nicely and the final effect is quite impressive.

15mm Athenian Greek Command Commission

15mm Greek Command Commission

Paul surprised me at Iceni earlier this month with another bag of figures to paint. He said "I want two Generals elements out of this lot and you can keep the rest." Since I was unsure which figures he wanted to use I painted up all fourteen castings. I have never painted AB Ancients before, they were cleanly cast but the Hoplites had a separate shield arm that needed to be glued onto the castings. They were fairly easy to paint up once I had settled on a colour scheme, helmet crests and sourced some suitable shield designs to copy by hand onto the plain bronze shield faces. The figures are on plain sand bases because Paul will be basing them himself to match his other elements in the Athenian Army he is building.

I think he will like them and once he decided what he wants to keep I may get some figures out of it for my own collection.

15mm Greek Cavalry Commission

15mm Greek Cavalry Commission

As part of an ongoing project one of my club mates is building an Athenian Later Hoplite Greek Army, specifically the one commanded by Iphikrates between 374 BC and 353 BC.

Part of the army commission meant I was asked to paint up sixteen Xyston Greek Cavalry, Codes ANC20025 & 20026. As with all Xyston castings there were lots of fine flow line tags and they of course require assembly. The figures on the website on show using one throwing javelin and with careful drilling out of both hands I was able to provide each casting with two javelins which looks more realistic.

I was asked to proved them unbased so he can match them to the rest of his army.