Anglo Danish Huscarls/Fryd Fourth Unit Finito

All the images in this article are "Clickable"

It has been slow progress of late on the painting table. A mixture of growing anxiety and isolation. I've been in self contained isolation now for nine months and I would be lying if I said it was not beginning to really get to me. Worry not, I wont dwell on this. I just needed to say it "out loud" for the sake of my own sanity. Back to the toys.

The fourth unit of Anglo Danes have now happily been completed. That is four out of the projected six and one unit of Norse as allies. I have another five Shieldwall Markers, four 40mm x 40mm Command and 12 bases of Skirmisher types to complete. I'm going be kind to myself and say that I'm just shy of being half way through the army. :>)

In order to keep things fresh on the painting table and with a view to hopefully putting on a game later this year at a show [fingers tightly crossed] I have decided to switch back over to my Early Byzantines for a while. Since returning to the hobby last November and having found a new "discipline" to my painting regime I feel confident that both projects will be completed by October this year, in so far as any wargames project is ever completed! I have been in communication with Keith from Aventine Miniatures who has provided me with clues as to what is planned for release with their spectacular Early Byzantine Range. If you are interested in the Eastern Romans/Early Byzantines you really must take a look at this very high quality range.

Back to the Anglo Danes.....

As mentioned earlier it has been slow going of late but the unit if finally varnished and based. This particular unit is my favourite out of all the Anglo Danish units I have painted thus far (all four lol). The mini taking the arrow in the chest along with the mini catching an arrow in his shield have set off the unit nicely without having what is arguably too dominant a feature such as some of my earlier casualties on the stands which took up most of the space on a base. 

One of the most fun and challenging aspects of putting together a unit in a tight Shieldwall formation is positioning the miniatures. To keep the appearance of mutual interaction during combat. This is not as easy as one might first think, especially on 40mm x 40mm bases! I think I have managed to make most of the miniature "talk" to one another. What do you think? I'm always open to suggestions so please leave a comment if you can think of a way of improving the over all impact of the composition.

First Huscarl Base- Command:

Second Huscarl Base:

Third Huscarl Base:

Forth Base- Fyrd:

Fifth Base- Fyrd:

Sixth Base- Fyrd:

Aventine Bolt Thrower WIP

I've been doing some work on another batch of speed painted 12 Beja for my Sudan project whilst waiting for the days to roll by as my last batch Early Byzantines wait for their coat of gloss varnish to go fully off. On the advice of a great painter Redzed and fellow compatriot of the very much missed Steve Dean Forum I am leaving the gloss varnish a week before applying a matt coat. I did a test mini last night on some I had already painted up and even after one light spray of matt varnish it has come out well with no sign of any speckling. good news indeed!! In future I will going to be using this particular varnishing method on all the mini's I take my time on so many thanks to Redzed for this great advice.

Fully Varnished Test Mini- Actual Size Give or Take a Few mm

(it will be getting another light spray of matt in a day or two):

Glossy Torsion engine and Crew:

Three Singers:

(To make up the numbers on the painting desk)

The next update on the Early Byzantines will be the back ranks of the Dismounted Bucellarii/Extra Heavy Infantry which should not be too long as they were completed prior to the bolt thrower lot.

Early Byzantine Skutatoi in Shieldwall Second Rank Added

Finally the gloss dried and I was able to apply a coat of matt varnish to the second rank of the Skutatoi in Sheildwall  yesterday. I know I keep raving about the quality of the Aventine Byzantines so please forgive me if I once more say, these Aventine Early Byzantines are such a high quality range. There is some very fine detail and they are expertly cast with no real flash to speak of. An occasional barely visible mould line but that is to be expected with any manufacturer of metal miniatures. 

The second rank were every bit as much fun to paint as the first rank which is not always the case in a unit that is largely uniform. As I type I have the third rank including the command glossed and ready for a matt coat in a few days. The final rank is in the process of having some paint splashed on and should be completed by the end of this evening. 

For anyone interested in what rules the miniatures are based for; I have used 40mm wide by 50mm deep bases on all of my Early Byzantine close order infantry miniatures. I plan on using *Swordpoint as my primary rule set as well as others. In order to place the mini's on the base and avoid just cramming them together, which would make no sense to me from an aesthetic perspective, I chose deeper bases oulined above rather than those prescribed in Swordpoint which are 4 miniature per base on a 40mm x 40mm for Close Order. If I get hit in the flank so be it! It will (probably) add to the fun. :>)

Here are some shots of the two ranks from the back which show off the details on the miniatures rather nicely. 

I have been spending quite a bit of time deliberating on what sort of banner design to paint up for the unit. Given that they are essentially low status warriors in the tier of the Eastern Roman military system where the real units of high status were the cavalry, I was thinking a more elaborate Chi Rho symbol below with a bit of decoration? I have an unarmoured Skutatoi unit that is up next on the painting table which I plan on just giving the smaller Aventine Banners with Emperor Jutsinian's Face embossed. Howver, that is for later.

I'm going to wait until the unit is completed before applying and filler/spackling and various grades of sand to the bases. 

Finally, an image of the first two ranks from a higher elevation which shows how the two ranks of Skutatoi interact with one another in the Shieldwall

*There is a lot to like about Swordpoint for this era as a great emphasis is placed on the line of battle, which seems to have a kind of evolution of it's own. If you look up Medieval Warrior's, Swordpoint Line of Battle video on YouTube (link below) you will see what I mean.