Monday 16 February 2015

Frälse till fots


I have now finished a unit of knights on foot.

I think I spend more time searching for information about which noblemen to include, their colours or heraldry markings and so on then actual time painting the unit. And Im still not secure to if I went with the right choices.

Anyhow I have now completed unit of dismounted knights belonging to the house of  Folkunga/ Bjälbo. And therefore the unit have been given a blue banner with an yellow lion. The variation on the lion is the one I think looks oldest of the ones I have found. It ties the colours of the knights together and shows they belong to the house of Folkunga/ Bjälbo.





The banner is hand painted and learned a valuable lesson when I used a pen to paint the black borders between the lion and the background... Wait until the pen have dried...
I had to repaint much of the yellow as the black lines got all smushed out when I touched it when I intended to glue it in the first time...




I have used more single bases on this unit then I normally do when painting units as I wanted to have more miniatures available to Lions Rampant or other skirmish games, but also to be able to mix some of these into medium infantry units for that extra level of punch in combat.

 
Folke Jarl
I have chosen to paint six of the Knights as belonging to Folke Jarl and emphasising heavily on the red and white.
The centre figure could be used to represent Folke Jarl.

Acourding to the Eric Chronicles Folke Jarl could be called the founder of the house of Folkungar/ Bjälbo.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_Chronicles
Other sources say differently but its worth noting.


I have previously painted some mixed infantry belonging to Folke Jarl, more on them here: http://kampgruppe-engel.blogspot.se/2013/10/medieval-infantry-of-folke-jarl.html


The next six knights are painted as to belong to Magnus Minnesköld
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnus_Minniski%C3%B6ld

I have seen several versions on his name and it could be linked to different variations and have different sources.
It could be synthesising on the word "Minne" which means memory.
It could be the on the word "Månesköld" which means moon shield and it could be "Minnisköld" which could be small shield.
I have chosen to give him a small shield with a moon on it.

For his closest men I have continued on the blue theme and I gave one of them the same moon on his shield.

This leaves me with four knights left. These I have painted somewhat generic an got them a multibase.

Another bonus with having so many of them single based, besides for Lion Rampant is that it will make it easier for me to include mixed foot knights into the ranks of lesser soldiers to stiffen them up. An idea I really and think is really historical correct and fitting, the rules for this I will borrow from the Feudal Scottish list in Hail Caesar.


6 comments:

  1. Great looking frälse unit - nice touch to use the crucifix on top of the banner.

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  2. Outstanding dismounted knights! Nifty work on the banner.

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  3. Great looking units Engel, good colours and I like the combination of units that you based together.

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  4. Amazing job on these knights!

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