15 mm Pecheneg Light Horse (Tin Soldier)

Introduction

These are the latest addition to my "fantasy" early medieval Byzantine army.

I’m describing this as fantasy because I haven’t made my usual effort to ensure historical accuracy. This is partly because the term “Byzantine” covers many centuries, and partly because a large proportion of the figures came from cheap bulk purchases at shows or job lots bought on eBay.

Figure review

This is the first time I've painted figures from Tin Soldier, who have a decent Byzantine range. I bought samples of both the cavalry and infantry.

The cavalry figures shown above are a standard 15 mm size and mix well with Essex figures. The infantry are similarly sized, although one or two were slightly smaller, so buyers should bear that in mind. Unfortunately, I couldn’t use the infantry I bought because I’m using Museum and Donnington figures, whose sculpts are considerably larger.

The Pecheneg figure looks to be on two illustrations from Ian Heath's 1980s book "Armies of the Dark Ages 600-1066 AD":

Pecheneg (17) & Asiatic light cavalry (82)

The one-piece castings required a lot of cleaning. At first sight they looked really well cast but closer inspection revealed lots of lumpy flash mainly associated with undercuts. I didn't spot some until I was half way through painting! Clearly the moulds have deteriorated, but luckily the "lumps" tended to pop off when "attacked" with a sharp knife. There was a fair bit of filing too.

Painting notes

The figures have a certain charm. Stylistically, they reminded me of Postage & Firmin's Noggin the Nog cartoons of my youth long ago. I sure this influenced how I painted them. I ended with an even more cartoon look than I normally aim for.

I particularly liked the hands, face and equipment which are well sculpted and easy to paint. I chose a standard drab colour scheme for what are essentially steppe nomad mercenaries. The only nod to history is the black cap.

The one drawback of one-piece castings is that it's sometimes difficult to reach places with a brush; not impossible just awkward. I was "forever" finding spots were I'd inadvertently caught one area whilst painting another. This was despite painting from the inside out!

The horses are excellent, however it was the first time I'd painted inscribed tack (rather than sculpted proud). In most places this wasn't a problem, but there were two places where I really struggled especially with light tack on a dark horse.

Finally, I found that my primer didn't work very well. I sometimes see small areas of bare metal on horses tails, noses, and hooves. They only appear because I repeatedly catch them when painting the rider. I simply re-prime before painting the horse. With these figures I saw metal in places I didn't expect such as the horses' flanks. I suspect the cause is residual mould release agent. Next time I'll wash them first to see if this improves matters.

Closing remarks

I enjoyed painting something by a different sculptor. They were surprisingly fiddly but that said they were worth the effort.

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