Starting Egyptian Army

Colin from Chariot Gamer blog http://chariotgamer.blogspot.com/ had been a "bad" influence on me for some time. He is heavily in to "chariot" period or, as some call it, "biblicals". On several forums he constantly talks about and share photos of various chariot period armies and promotes companies that make miniatures for the period. So, I decided to finally start on my Egyptians that I had for a very long time and just didn't have time or desire to paint.

My Egyptians are mix of Foundry, Ral Partha (now Iron Wind) and Essex. So far I only painted few units, kind of randomly.

Egyptian Marines was the first unit I painted. Foundry makes excellent models that are perfect for those elite warriors, only musician is Ral Partha. Marines were distinguished from other Egyptian units and wore leather reinforced kilts for rowing benches. They also were armed with variety of weapons for naval actions and generally better armored. My unit has archers, slingers and spearmen/javelinmen.

Bowmen were important part of Egyptian army through their entire history. They were often employed in closed order formations for saturation fire, to destroy the enemy before close combat or weaken him for their spearmen formations to finish the job. Entire unit are excellent Foundry models with the exception of Ral Partha (Iron Wind now) standard bearer.

Egyptian army was often polyglot and army employed variety of people for their unique skills. I decided that one of my bowmen units should be from south of Egypt and composed of famous Nubian archers. The whole unit would counts as bowmen, but it has javelinmen figures for variety. All of them are Foundry models that were marketed as Nubians and Medjey when I purchased them. For some reason I couldn't find original concave oval shields, so I used some extra Old Glory flat oval shields. Close enough, I think.

Essex recently redesigned their Egyptians. I think they still sell older models, but added many new. My other bowmen unit will be composed of very good Essex models. Here is just a taste, several different archer poses that Essex offers now.

Below is a comparison between 3 different companies. Left to right: 1 Ral Partha, 2 Essex models, 1 Foundry. In my opinion, they fit perfectly together.

I'll probably paint chariots next, just follow my blog.