Thursday 9 June 2016

The last of my Syldavians

Well, I've now finished off my Syldavian forces for my 18th century imagi-nations project, so here is the last set of figures, a group of regular Hussars, representing the Vranac Regiment;


The backstory for this regiment is as follows;

In the days when Syldavia was a vassal of the Sublime Porte the country was only permitted to have a small army. In addition to the Royal troops, the Prince-Archbishop of Smyntz was granted the right to have a personal guard consisting of two companies of foot and one of horse.

In the years following the end of Ottoman vassalage these companies were expanded to become two regiments of infantry and a regiment of cavalry, designated as Hussars, and wearing a traditional Syldavian version of the Hussar uniform.  When Prince-Archbishop Filip Balonyi was elevated to the rank of Cardinal, the Hussars adopted an all-red uniform. They were popularly known as the Crvene Kape (Red Hats) because they wore red felt kalpaks trimmed with white sheepskin. 

When the Cardinal's troops were absorbed into the Royal army as part of the 1748 military reorganisation, the Cardinal's Hussars were renamed as the Vranac Regiment, after their new commander, Ritter Egon Vranac and given a new grey uniform. As part of this, they adopted brown fur busbies with a red falling bag. Officers are distinguished by wearing red boots.




3 comments:

  1. They look terrific. May I suggest that it is relatively easy to use a small pair of pliers to bend the Essex poses into more variety and more natural arm positions? get a small pair of hobby pliers, glue some felt onto them so you don't damage the castings and bend gently...

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    Replies
    1. Thanks Doug. That is a good idea for getting more variety. I must say that what I've been trying to do is steer a compromise between a modern naturalistic appearance and the classic old school Charles Grant look to the regiments, which I rather like.

      It is a difficult trick to pull off, though.

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  2. Those look quite the thing.

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