Visit to Musée de l'Armée, Paris. Lots of XVII c. stuff

 

Hello guys,

I spent the first week of January 2023, revisiting Paris, and  I miraculously convinced my girlfriend to go to the military museum with me! She patiently paid attention to all my tedious explanations for almost 3 hours.

The collection is HUGE, I was very interested on WWI and WWII stuff, but in this blog, I will show to you some items related to XVII c. warfare.

The first pics are the tombs of both Turenne and Vauban behind the big dome, next to Napoleon's tomb.

Spanish gun, 1638, labelled as artillery of the army of Cardinal Infante, Don Fernando de Austria, brother of King, Philip IV of Spain.

coat of arms of Cardinal Infante

Spanish royal arms

French guns

Very interesting gun from Marine Royale, the brand new navy of France, heavily reinforced by Cardinal Richelieu

Now some nice mid to late XVII c. siege armor

Cuirassier armor from early and mid XVII C.

 several nations:

Armor of Louis XIV

Armour and horse dress of Condé ?

Heavy Pikeman and Buffcoats

This pistol-axe is quite interesting because I have a 28mm  model of French dismounted cuirassier wielding one, so I could not resist to post here!

Late XVII c. French cavalry flag, I thought they were bigger!

Flag of an Irish regiment in French service !

late XVIIc. French drum

Duke D'Enghien in 1646 after taking Dunkirk

Battle of Senneffe 1674

Turenne

XVII c. Ship models 1/600 vs 1/1200

 Hello guys,

This is the first post of 2023 :D I am very excited about a new mini project (literally mini), I am getting into naval wargaming, and can't decide which scale fits better to my needs and to my taste:

1/600 and 1/1200...    In both scales you can finde great models and fantastic rules. For example I placed an order on Warfare Miniatures'  naval rules, "Mad for War"  XVII c naval engagements, but I would also like to try Warlord Games' "Black Seas",   XVIII-XIX c. battles.    The first one is 1/1200 scale and the second is 1/700 o 1/600.

Regarding the models, my choice for 1/1200 is Ark Royal miniatures, the naval brand of Warfare Miniatures/League of Augsburg, I have not seen them in flesh, but ordered a small fleet this week. I also bought a 3D printer last November and have made some print test of naval models by Henry Turner miniatures, they are 1/600 but reduced the scale with the 3d printer software !

The finished model I bring you today is 3d printed in 1/1200

My choice for 1/600 will be Minairons Miniatures, like this late Galleon. A very good sculpt although the sails are metal and a little bit heavy for my taste, appart from that, perfect for my needs.

Also Warlord Games galleons and galleys seems very nice, although I don't own any of them.

1/600 Flags are by Minairons too, In my humble opinion, the best out there! They also modified some of their flags for 1/1200 scale so I will show you the result in the near future.

This is the finished model, I have no ratlines ( I think that is the English name) so it seems a little bit "nude" in this scale.

My intention is wargaming a wide variety ot conflicts from late XVI to 80 Years War, 30 Years War, and late XVII conflicts in Europe, Asia and the Caribbean, building small navies for Spain, France, Netherlands, England, maybe Portugal too.

The question is …Which scale to choose? Maybe both , I don’t know yet.

One point is detail vs numbers, in 1/600 there is a lot of work to put in, plus the tedious rigging of the ship, which in 1/1200 is much simpler. I will post soon pics of Ark Royal metal miniatures in 1/1200 to compare.

Here some pics of both models