Sunday 22 February 2015

Republican Romans.

Having finished painting a whole box worth of Italian Allies a couple of weeks back, I've finally got round to making a start on their Roman compadres.
Having used the classic red & off-white shields for the allies these chaps are going to be sporting natty yellow ochre scuta.



Not sure I can offer any documentary evidence to support this choice of colour other than the availability of ochre as a pigment, either as a mineral or from boiling onion skins.
The plan is to take advantage of the wet weather & finish a few more of these this afternoon, but the lure of red wine & a comfortable sofa may yet prove too much!

Just a quick side note on these Victrix boxed sets. These are certainly the best ancients figures Victrix have released to date, the detail is a lot sharper than exhibited on the Hoplite boxed sets & the choice of headgear a lot better. Some of the helmets in the Mercenary Hoplite set were weird to say the least.
My only minor gripe is the variation in size of the Roman heads

There are two definite examples ( LH4 & LH11 above) & a not so obvious third (LH10) where the heads are noticeably larger than the other nine. As I say only a minor quibble but its a shame it was allowed to slip through into the finished product, particularly as the Latin Allies boxed set didn't have this issue. Still at least there are sufficient alternatives provided.