Thermopylae 2 - the Persians.

One of my 'more than one post a day ' features... never could hold stuff back so everything will be moved/photographed/posted, Thermoppylae 3 will probably appear later today!

If you follow the numbers given by Richard Nelson in the WRG book 'Armies of the Greek and Persian Wars' the Persian army could have been about 149,500 strong rather than the 1,275,000 from the list provided by Herodotus. This would equate to 7,475 figures at a 20:1 scale - not going to happen!

Overall view of the Persian army. I haven't tried an accurate count but it's about 900 infantry and 150 cavalry. Or  a mere 18,000 infantry and 3,000 cavalry 20:1 - or about a seventh of the size it needs to be!

Xerxes watching from a hill with his Guard cavalry at his side and Immortals in front. This terrain board had a small stream running through it which I've just ignored!

The vast majority of the figures are Garrison but there are a few others lying around. The middle two units are Minifigs PB my original 70s Persian army. Actually, not sure about that - archers may have originally been from the Minifigs Fantasy range. It was a long time ago. The Persian javelins to their left are ex-Harry, the two bases to their right are Garrison conversions - lots of these on sand coloured bases are in the Egyptian army, these are dedicated Persian army for DBA. There are a lot of conversions in my Garrison Persian army.

This lot are mostly from Asia Minor - Carian hoplites to the front, backed by a 70s unit of Ionians, then a load of Garrison Phrygians. Camels in the army are supposed to be Arabs, this lot will just have to pretend. Keep thinking 'need more camels'. I don't, but not about to let that concern me.

Sakae/Scythians - all conversions though for some at least they are Gallic archers painted as Scythians. The Sparabara unit includes a few of the long gone Warrior Greek and Persian Wars range.

I admit some of these views are a bit random but - well, never mind. A view of the entire Persian army.

Technically the Thebans were still on the Greek side at this time but as I always associate Thebes with the Persians I thought I'd just include them anyway. The unit behind them is an original 70's Egyptian unit. The Egyptian horse archers are more recent conversions.

More conversions. All of these figures are conversions, even the Guard cavalry - I took the original rider and remade and cast it as a one piece casting to make casting easier. At some point I should do a few head swap conversions on this figure...

Another gratuitous 'most of the army' picture.

So that's the setup. Next thing is to start moving them around.