BattleStandard Persian Cavalry

Finally, had an opportunity to paint something for myself. I decided to add one more unit to my ancient Persian army after watching clip of battle of Gaugamela from "Alexander" on YouTube. One of the few phrases that Persian king has is "Envelop khim, Bessus". So, Bessus' heavy cavalry it was.

Battlestandard miniatures has a very nice range of 28mm Achaemedian Persians http://www.battlestandardminiatures.com/. I only have their super heavy elite cavalry. Spear hands had to be drilled, sword and other hands were casted like that. Spears are also from Battlestandard. Riders fit on horses very well. Riders poses are a bit flat and all have the same type of Greek style armor with slightly different Greek/Assyrian style helmets. Figures are chunky with fairly large heads and well raised details. Horses have eastern style front armor and riders have scaled skirts, very popular heavy armor for eastern type shock cavalry of the period.

Battlestandard miniatures are BIG. I already have my Persian army composed of miniatures from other companies. As you can see Battlestandard figures are bigger. This, however, is not a problem. Persian elite cavalry of this type was described as having unusually large horses for the period. I do not mind having one unit like that. Below are comparison between Battlestandard, 1st Corps Persian cavalry, Eureka Amazon Scythian and A&A Parthian horse archers. All recruited in to my polyglot Persian army.