Early Byzantines coming !!

Hello fellows,

Some years ago, I started a project, armies of late antiquity in 28mm, I built a Sassanid army, almost completed, a Goth army (almost completed too) and a Late Roman, Patrician and Belisarian/Justinian army... the latter is my favourite, but, sadly, nobody produces proper miniatures for Justinian armies.

Inspired by venerable Warhammer Historical books, full of nice pictures of  Perry and Gripping beast miniatures I painted some samples for my upcoming Byzantines! I say upcoming because Aventine Miniatures and Footsore, have announced that range in the "near" future!

Until that moment, I have painted some units for my Late Romans that can be used for those Eastern Romans.


First, a test model for a unit of Belisarius' personal Bucellarii, as seen in one Kevin Dallimore's book, published by Foundry, with some pics of Foundry's Late Romans converted into Belisarian Byzantines... here you have my personal approach:

I also painted an "Army standard bearer"converting lightly a Foundry Cataphract, I just copied or try to emulate a photo of the book "Fall of the West" by Warhammer Ancient Armies:

Apart from those sample miniatures, I painted a "unit", based for Impetus, of Belisarian Bucellarii, using Old Glory Belisarian range. Their cavalry is not bad, but, in my opinion, the infantry is not historically accurate or even well sculpted. My inspiration was the book "Byzantium beyond the Golden Gate" from Warhammer Ancient Battles, which portrays some pictures of Old Glory figures.

Sorry for the quality of the pics...

Old Glory also produces some armoured horse archers, I think in their medieval Byzantine range, I "converted some of them using Foundry heads in order to make them look more "Belisarian" or Roman and less medieval...

I also love the sculpts of Foundry Clibanarii, so I painted a unit of "Sagittarii Clibanarii", mentioned in the Notitia Dignitatum, as a unit in the army of Egypt (I think...)  I only painted the buckler shields in the appropriate historical colours imho.  Two of the horses are Old Glory, all of them "half armored", they look Belisarian to me.

Finally, some infantry, Skutatoi or Legionaries, from Gripping Beast , painted several years ago, with a lower quality paintjob.  One officer is a converted plastic Saxon from Gripping Beast and a WestWind head.

I hope you like this project!

Cheers