North Africa and Sicily (9th – 11th century)

Next on my list of conversions are the North African and Sicilian Muslim army. Like the Andalusian and Almoravid armies, figures for the North African are conversions of the Colonial Sudanese and for the most part this will require repositioning of weapons, new paint and rebasing.

You can see an overview of the figures in photo number one; these will cover all the options for army list III/33. The Sudanese ‘ansar’ figures all lack shields and a recent order on Donnington with their great selection of shield types will rectify this.

After an hour and a half you can see in the second photo the result of figures separated from their old bases, cleaned and bagged. Figures such as the generals, their bodyguard and lancers, will be worked on first as these have shields and can be later rebased.

Aside from repositioning their lances, all the cavalry horses have their tails shortened to allow better placement on their new bases. These should take a few days to paint and rebase, then I can move on to batch number two, the Berber light horse.  

Photo one  

Photo two  

Photo three

09-07-2020

Shields arrived recently and completion of the Muslim North African collection moved into high gear. Painting the infantry in varied colours was helped with the use of a guide showing the alternating pattern between tunic and turban. The light horse followed a similar pattern.

Painting guide

Photo front

Photo back  

What remains of the former Colonial Sudanese army is being parcelled out into future medieval Muslim armies, but more on that at a later date.