Wednesday 10 February 2010

Batavian Auxiliaries and 50th Post!

A while ago I thought of creating a unit of Batavian Auxiliaries after seeing this post on Iron Mitten. Secundus used Warlord Romans for his but on closer inspection of the figures, I decided they would look too out of place in my Caesarian army.

I emailed the guys at 1st Corps a little while ago to ask when they'd be posting up photos of their 'Slave Revolt' range and to my suprise, the following weekend they uploaded photos of the range! I found this pack of heavy infantry for the slave army that would look just right as Batavian Auxiliaries! Batavia is what is now modern day Netherlands and these warriors were renowned for their bravery and skill as fighters, hence why the Romans consistently recruited from the region.


Picture from 1st Corps Slave Revolt range.

I love the fact they look very rough and ready with their beards and lack of sandles - perfect for a semi-barbaric unit. Plus they have the Gallic helmets the rest of my troops have. I wanted your opinion on whether to go for all hexagonal shields like the guy third from the left or all oval shields? Would a unit like this have uniform shields? Or be allowed celtic-style shields from their home province?

Painting update: I'm a bit frustrated at the minute trying to paint over black and silver undercoats - it's not easy! In fact, I'm having to paint darker shades of the same colour on before hand which is dramatically increasing my painting time. Slow progress ahoy...

P.S. this is my 50th post since April 2009. Hurrah!

4 comments:

Broeders said...

Is drybrushing not doing the job? I've found that drybrushing silver over black works well for most armour and (as long as you don't under or overload the brush) provides a quick result that is pleasing on the eye. Worked on the wolfskins and should work for armour.

BigRedBat said...

Congrats on 50 posts!

Yer can't have Batavian Auxiliaries in a Caesarian army, 'cos Batavia wasn't allied then.

You could have them in an early Imperial army, though. This site is brilliant on Batavians:

http://www.romanarmy.net/batavianhelm.htm

I insist you model at least one with the martin-fur-and-feather helmet. If you are doing the Batavians, you may want flat oval shields, although square or hexagonal would be fine.

If you want them to be Caesarian-era troops, then maybe rebadge them as legionaries recruited from the Gauls; possible the Alaudae? They became an elite legion...

Secundus said...

Glad to be of help. I actually never got around to making a unit of Batavians. I keep leaving the best to last, the cherry on the cake I call it, It helps me finish off my less intresting units.
The only trouble is I always get side tracked and never get around to painting up my favouraite units. Good luck with yours and don't let yourself get sidetracked...stay on target.

If you look back at the beginning of my Blog you will see I was banging on about Batavians then and after countless Roman regiments, I still haven't got any Batavians.

Secundus said...

I do like your find of figures though very apt.