15 mm Later Thracians (Essex Miniatures)

With this post my 2024 Hellenistic project reaches an important milestone.  The units pictured are the last I must paint before the KITN competition in October.  Their completion means that anything I paint after this is a bonus.

Once again they are venerable Essex sculpts (MPA3 Thracian: Peltast with Rhomphaia & shield).  Well up to their usual standard with few, if any, defects and a more detailed figure review isn't necessary.  However, one rhomphaia was miscast but a call to Essex sorted that out very quickly.

Research
Once again Duncan Head's "Armies of the Macedonian and Punic Wars" (AMPW) provided more than a few useful pointers.  From pages 124 to 126 and figures 65 & 66 I gleaned:

• Clothing colours are white, off-white, cream, rose, light blue, light green and a variety of reds and red-browns.
• In contrast to earlier fashions, cloaks and tunics are usually plain, though the tunic of this figure, red-brown with one white stripe on each sleeve and two down each side, is worn by a servant elsewhere in the tomb.
• The Kazanluk shields are painted in light ochre; Thracians serving Perseus of Macedon carried white thureoi.

Painting notes
So much for the historical information.  When it came to painting I was also influenced by Steve Dean's excellent work on the same figures for his Seleucid army.  I still don't know how he manages to paint eyes on these figures!

For the shields, I decided to simplify Steve's designs:

• Some are white with a central horizontal band in a range of muted colours.
• Some are white, or light cream, with the tips in much stronger colours.
• In a nod to history, I left a few plain white.
• The majority of the central spines are iron but some of the light cream shields are brass.

I painted some tunics with edged sleeves & hems and the remainder plain.  Some edging is supported by AMPW but not in the way I painted them.  However, the figures are much improved by contrast hems.

Basing
These units are based as medium infantry for Art de la Guerre (ADLG) with six figures on a 40 mm square base.  I wanted a slightly irregular look to the unavoidable two lines of three figures.

Whilst painting the figures I noticed that the vast majority (19 of 24) were based on the same basic "dolly" with only a change in the position of the right arm and weapon.  I became increasingly worried they would look a little too "regimented".

I need not have worried.  As I "dry fitted" some figures to a base I realised I'd not noticed that the sculptor had rotated the heads as well as altering the arm position.  I found that if I placed all the figures facing forward, I had to break the two lines to get them to fit; as if by magic I got the irregular look I was after.

Finally, here are some additional photos:

List of all the project posts