Now Thenn...

Inspired by this guy, I've decided to break up my Renaissance modelling with the first humble efforts of my Game of Thrones project. I can't really afford to start a whole new project from scratch, but I do have a scattering of Vikings, ancient Celts, and late medieval mercenaries left over from aborted projects, that I think I can at least experiment with.

So with that in mind, here is a pair of Thenns, wildlings from the Thenn valley of Westeros. They are essentially Warlord Games Celts, with one Gripping Beast viking shield, one viking axe, on GW shield, and a bunch of disks cut from a GW spear shaft.

Future Thenns (and other wildlings) will probably have extra fur outerwear sculpted on, it gets cold up north.

Jan II Kazimierz (in progress)

So, the Polish commander at Beresteczko was the Polish-Lithuanian king, Jan II Kazimierz Waza. He was an interesting fellow... besides his period as elected king, he also served as an officer in foreign armies and occasionally entered the clergy as well. He looked like this:

Now, this portrait is from about a decade after Beresteczko. I figured that in battle he probably would have left behind the fancy sleeves (because I certainly didn't feel like sculpting them). Also, I don't know if cravats were trendy yet in 1651 either, so I was willing to leave that out as well. After some consideration, I decided to use this version of Charles I of England. Warlord and TAG are usually my go-to companies for this era, but Bicorne's version really sold me on its haughty demeanor.

But, of course, Charles' delicate Stuart features and luxurious facial hair needed fixing. I had to file off the goatee and the tips of his mustache, then sculpt on a slight nose extension, some bangs and additional hair, and a proper Habsburg lower lip (Jan II was a Vasa through his father, but had Habsburg blood through his mother, and it shows.) Also I changed his preexisting medal to an Order of the Golden Fleece.

And then I painted it. I'm not much of a detail painter, but I put a bit of extra effort into the face. I don't know if it paid off. Haven't painted the horse yet, I'm not sure if I want the tack to be red/white Polish colors, or blue/yellow Vasa colors, or neutrals.

Spears and Pikes

So it came to my attention that Cossacks never used pikes. So I went and had a brief but satisfying conversation with an expert, and discovered that they used spears instead. He was even kind enough to provide a size reference chart to guide me (spisa is Polish for spear). Note that the sizes are given in centimeters, and meant for 15mm scale, so I have to double the numbers.

Well, when I built my Cossack "pike" men, I had given them slightly shorter weapons than my German-style pikemen just on a hunch. It turns out, the length I guessed is correct according to the By Fire and Sword guideline. So while I had been mistaken, it appears that my mistake was one of terminology and usage, not modeling.