Greek and Scicilian Hoplites

The latest addition to my Pyrrhic Army are a couple of units of Hoplites and compared to the Pike Phalanxes I painted recently these were a doddle! The detailing on these figures is very good and perfectly suits my approach to painting 6mm models making them a pleasure to paint.

Hoplites were the citizen soldiers of the Ancient Greek city states and were primarily armed as spearmen. Their name derives from the Hoplon, the round shield used by these troops. Like the Pike units I completed recently the Hoplites fought in a Phalanx, a close order formation that relied on discipline and training for its effectiveness.

I have painted two units one is in white armour with white shields with coloured designs on them. The other unit are veterans from Akragas in Sicily. I wanted to paint these with black armour but I didn't like the look of plain black so instead I opted to use a dark blue. With an ink wash over the top these look almost black but with just a hint of definition and detail.

I actually had both these units more or less finished a week ago but I have been waiting for some decals to arrive in the post. I have often painted shield designs by hand in the past but a recent disaster convinced me that painting detailed designs on a shield no more than 3 mm diameter was a route to madness! In a last minute change of heart I opted only to use the coloured decals (from Baccus) on the white shields, but hand painted slightly cruder designs on the Black shields. I'm quite chuffed with the results so I think I made the right choice.

Two bases of 96 infantry figures earned me a respectable 48 points and moved me another step closer to my overall target.