New 28mm Project: The Palmyrene Armies of Odaenathus and Zenobia (260–272 AD)

 Hi guys,

After finishing several armies over the years, I’ve decided to start a new 28mm project,  one that bridges my love for Roman history and the dramatic story of Palmyra’s rise and fall.

This time, I’m building a mixed Roman–Palmyrene army from the mid–3rd century, representing the forces of Odaenathus of Palmyra in his campaigns against the Sassanid Persians, and later, those of Queen Zenobia and General Zabdas during their rebellion against Aurelian’s Roman Empire (circa 260–272 AD).

It’s a fascinating period: the Roman East in turmoil, after the capture of Valerian...  legions mixing with desert cavalry, cataphracts, Camels and archers from the great caravan city of Palmyra. The project lets me explore both sides of this conflict, since I already have a painted Sassanid army and a half–finished Roman force from the 3rd century, perfect opponents for the new troops.

The miniatures come mainly from A&A miniatures, Wargames Atlantic, both in plastic (Romans) and 3D resin, with some excellent additions from Blitzkrieg Miniatures. I plan to base them for Hail Caesar and Impetus, two of my favorite rulesets for large ancient battles.

The plan is to build the Palmyrene army in stages , starting with the Romanized core under Odaenathus, then expanding into the later “Empire of the East” phase under Zenobia, with more Eastern cavalry, archers, and cataphracts.

I hope to see both armies clashing on the tabletop soon.

28mm Lakhmid Arab cavalry (Sassanid allies) PART II END

 Hello guys!

Finally , since 2020, I managed to finish my Lakhmid cavalry for my Sassanid army.

Here you have the first post with the history and conversion process:

https://spanishleadpainting.blogspot.com/2020/05/28mm-conversions-lakhmid-arab-cavalry.html

The miniatures are a mixture of Gripping beast plastic Arab heavy cavalry,  Armorum & Aquila Sassanids horse archers in armor. I painted them mostly in Vallejo and Foundry paints in triads.

I started the painting process in early March, but an eyes operation prevented me to finish the unit until May!  I tried to use earthy and warm tones, like the illustration above, I also painted a couple of horse saddle with leopard skin like the noble warrior of the illustration.

The shields are A&A with Little big men studios decals from their Sassanid range.

The plastic horses are nice and pleasant to paint, also the plastic rider, which , in my opinion, is a good miniature compared with other plastic kits from Gripping Beast.

The unit is based for Impetus or Basic Impetus, like the rest of my late antiquity armies.

I hope you like them!

Cheers

3rd Century Romans project

 Hello guys,

I have a semi abandoned project since 2015 or so...  The III Century Crisis / Middle Imperial Romans. But now, I got some inspiration and started again the project. 

Recently I bought Wargames Atlantic new "Late Romans" plastic miniatures, but they are indeed Mid to Late Romans, so I decided to use the box for my now resurrected project, and also for my other Roman army (Late/Patrician).

I had already a bunch of excellent A&A Armorum & Aquila miniatures, almost the whole army, although unpainted. My idea is to use them for Impetus or Hail Caesar, and I have a lead pile that consists of 4 legionaries unit, 2 Lanciarii or Auxiliares, 1 Unit of armoured archers, 1 unit of equites and some extras.

It is not my top priority project, but I will slowly be building up this army to fight against my Sassanids or even fight between themselves, as III century Romans often did !

I show you here the first unit I painted a while ago,  A&A Miniatures, with Littlebigmen transfers, based on the design of scutum/shield found at Dura Europos.

And now some test models of Wargames Atlantic and A&A miniatures with other design of scutum with Littlebigmen transfer, and with a hand painted shield of Legio II Parthica.

Here you have some artwork by several painters of the shield design I have used for this new legion :)

28mm Sassanid Savaran cavalry

Hi guys,

This time I come with a heavy post, in all senses (bad joke), Sassanid heavy Savaran “knights”. The Sassanid Clibanarii armed with bows and hand weapons like maces or swords, I also have Cataphracts/Clibanarii with Kontos (very long spear) and bows but they will come in a future post, as they are not all painted.

The Aswārān (singular aswār), also spelled Asbārān and Savaran, was a cavalry force that formed the backbone of the army of the Sasanian Empire. They were provided by the aristocracy, were heavily armored, and ranged from archers to cataphracts.

I bought this miniatures second hand, unpainted, from a member of Lead Adventure Forum, some years ago. They are a mix of Armorum & Aquila miniatures with some Gripping Beast miniatures. In my opinion they are not as nice as most recent Aventine miniatures Sassanids, they are nice enough for me, and they are historically accurate, more suitable for Early Sassanid armies.

I chose bright colours, as I see this type of colours and patterns in several artworks from books and magazines, I also got inspirations from pics of painted armies like the one depicted in Warhammer "Beyond the Golden Gate" or Dr. Phil Hendry's own army.

I have 3 units or 3 bases in total,  based initially for Basic Impetus, but I also play Hail Caesar. I painted one of them in the last few days, but the other two units were painted some years ago. I took pictures of all of them yesterday.

The first one, painted in late May, 4 miniatures: 3 A&A miniatures, 1 Foundry horse, 1 Gripping beast rider and horse. By the way, the standard is Aventine Miniatures!

The second unit, painted some time ago, 3 A&A miniatures with a Gripping Beast

The Third unit, painted also some time ago, 3 A&A miniatures with a Gripping Beast

Family photo: Persian Panzers!

28mm conversions! Lakhmid Arab cavalry (Sassanid allies)

Hello guys,

I have been trying to include a little unit of Lakhmid cavalry to my Sassanid Persian army of III-VI centuries since 2017, but without success, due to the lack of appropriate miniatures, Until now (imho).

The Lakhmids were an Arab (Nestorian Christian) kingdom of southern Iraq with al-Hirah as their capital, from about 300 to 602 AD. They were generally but intermittently the allies and clients of the Sassanian Empire, and participant in the Roman–Persian Wars.

In the battle of Dara, and later in Callinicum (533 annd 534 AD) they fought in great numbers (roughly 5000 men, mostly mounted) as horse archers, regular cavalry and some camel riders.

The miniatures themselves are the following:

I decided to use a mixture of Gripping beast plastic Arab heavy cavalry, and Armorum & Aquila Sassanids horse archers in armor. There is also a metal javelinman cut in half and converted into swordsman with bow.

The plastic kit is quite versatile, I used the horses provided in it for all miniatures, and the lower half of the riders for a couple of miniatures, but I cut and sanded the stirrups in order to eliminate them

(they would appear a century later )

The plastic bodies are nice, with lamellar armor, perfect for this project, as I have seen depictions of Lakhmids using it.

example of Lakhmid cavalry in videogame "Attila Total War", just for painting inspiration, but showing an interesting variety of equipment.

Also some heads are suitable for Lakhmids, like the plastic Sassanian style helmet, or the metal helmet with a cloth surrounding it (to prevent the heat in the metal helmet). It seem in that era turbans were not used, so I avoided turbans and other stuff more proper to the crusades era (like muslim curved swords or later types quivers for arrows etc).

In this image of Spanish magazine "Desperta Ferro" you can see a Muslim warrior (left) fighting a Sassanid champion (right), although is a century later than battles between Belisarius and the Sassanids, the equipment probably was very similar, I am referring to the clothed metal helmet of the Arab.

this guy is a Sassanid body (Sassanid provided most of the equipment and weapons of Lakhmids) with an Arab head, with a similar helmet of the previous illustration and screenshot of the videogame "Attila Total War".

This well equiped horse archers is similar to my noble or officer :

Finally, a more modest warrior:

I will additionally use Sassanid shields with its transfers by littlebigmen studios.

I found this banner on the internet, it seems it belonged somehow to Lakhmid Arabs, but I am by no means sure of that... I will not use it becuase the origin of the information is not known to me.

Finally, you can see here, in the good old Warhammer Ancients Battles supplement, a brief description of the Lakhmids in Wargames, as they appear in several rule sets and army lists as "Arab cavalry" and other similar names.

I hope you like it!