Sunday, December 13, 2009

Sorry Nan...


This week I have continued to dip away and have jumped onto another batch of Celts. As a gamer I'm not so keen on totally naked warriors because my Roman wars are set in and around 69AD and most Celts would have wrapped up by then. However, having hundreds of naked men hanging around in the closet I thought it was time to bring them out...in the skirmish units. I guess that If there were still Celts running around in the buff in the mid 1st Century, they would be found out in front of the War bands letting it all hang out and showing off how brave they were. Also from a painting perspective, they are very quick to do and once they have a large shield, no one really notices...apart from friends and family.

7 comments:

BigRedBat said...

Easy peasy Secundus; start another earlier period Roman army to fight them!

Copplestone Caesarians or Aventine Republicans would be nice options...

FWIW in 69AD, some Germans were still fighting nekkid to the waist.

Shah said...

Very good article and I appreciated your blog.

freaky fre said...

hi, I follow your blog now for 4 years. I'm selling my painted celts on e-bay. maybe you are interested.
look for pro painted 28mm celts.
they are really good painted.
greatings frederik viaene.

Secundus said...

Hi Freaky fre, we go back a long way. I remember you were one of my first buddies in the world of Blog. Good to see you are still around and painting. I have so many unpainted Celts I don't think I could bring myself to buy any more, but thanks for the tip off.

Rodney Anonymous said...

"Clothes make the man. Naked people have little or no influence on society." - Mark Twain

I recently faced the "to clothe or not to clothe" dilemma, as I too am working on some Celts from the same period. As I see it, you have two options:

1) Go nekkid. Nothing says "fanatic" like a naked man with a pointy stick. Trust me; this is a pretty common occurrence here in Philly. If anyone points to the nude figures as being historically inaccurate, you can respond with a) that during certain Celtic holidays, warriors of the 1st century CE did, indeed, take to the battlefield in the buff, or b) that Celtic warriors were also considerable taller than 28 mm, yet no one ever says "look how tiny those guys are!"

2) Give your fanatics "Gang colors". This is the approach I went with. All of my fanatics are stripped to the waist, painted with woad, and have lime-spiked hair. The occasional severed head helps to complete the picture (Warlord was kind enough to include a few of these in each box).

BigRedBat said...

If you call your nekkid celts Galatians, then you can have a whole army-worth of them. Or paint a unit up as the mercenary bodyguard to some Pharoah or other middle-eastern potentate.

Secundus said...

My view has always been, If you got'em...paint'em. I don't mind them that much and rather enjoy the painting speed inwhich they are completed. I have always tried to blend them in with other clothed figures to make up the numbers on bases. I ordered loads of them from AandA miniatures many years ago when I was collecting one of their armies. Looking back, I would of not ordered so many and just stuck to the clothed ones. Oh the folly of youth.