Hoplite Shield Designs

[Gaius Julius Caesar]

Hey Stefanos! Thanks for posting the link with the shield designs!
Is there a way to read the labels under them, as they are not 100% clear?

[hoplite14gr]

Periklis - part of the effort we put on the magazine is to help scale modelers in their accuracy.
We would love to have people painting more accurate Spartans.
Just mentioned our effort when someone asks you where you got your info.

As for
http://www.300spartanwarriors.com/battl ... ponry.html
Since the letters are difficult to make out:
1st row from the left:
Royal solar symbol, Bodyguard(Achean origins), Bodyguard(Doric origins),
Talthybiadae herald, Aegidae Spartoi (indigenous), Neodamodes and Periokoi after 400 B.C.
2nd row from the left:
Sparta, Amyklae (Perioikos?), Pylos, Elos, Geronthrae, Steniklaros, Limnatis(new landholder) Skirits (Dorean?)
3rd row from the left:
Amyklae(Homois?), Limnatis(old landholder), Skiritis (Perioikos?)
4th row from the left:
Achean triangles, Doric menandroi (Dymanes, Pamfileis, Hylleis)

Kind regards

[Anonymous]

Maybe you should get a two headed Snake!!! this would be more fitting!!

Sorry, Wulf, I've only just seen this post. In what sense would the two-headed serpent be more fitting?

[lupus]

Spartan shields from our team:
http://www.300spartanwarriors.com/battl ... ponry.html
Enjoy

hoplite14gr can i use these symbols on the shields of my figures for the Thermopylae battle? It will be something like this:

My dear friend... these scene don't having SPARTANS. At least, these ARMORS are not the ones that Spartans used in Thermopylae...
They're looking more Athenians to me...

Cheers...

[Giannis K. Hoplite]

I would be delighted to know what defferences you can spot between Spartan and Athenian armour...

[Mythos_Ruler]

I believe Spartans used bronze cuirass at the time - not linen linothorax as depicted in your diorama I'm afraid.

[hoplite14gr]

A quick note on Ancient Greek uniformity.
Ancients had like us the IFFF problem. (Identification Friend From Foe)
Some common dress or device of totemic style existed in the Neolithic clans.
In the bronze age the "boar tusk" helmet and the horns on helmet and lated the 8-shaped shield that seem not to be used bu other cultures were the mark of the Aegean Warrior.
From the Geometric era to Early Archaic era it was hard to distinguish between the who was who.
As a way to counter that the shield device was developed.
Example
There was no way to distinguish between the Spartans and the Argives who fought in Hysiae in 669 B.C. who was who based on their armor.
Contemporary warrior depictions from both places show mixture corinthian and "illyric" helmets and fragments from chalcidic have been excavated.
Only the white color of the Argive shield would distinguished an Argive from a Spartan of the Aegidae clan (snake on shield too!)

There is no armor that can be identified as charcteristically Spartan or non Spartan.
Considering the Spartan help in overthrowing the Peseistratides and the gifts given to them why the "attic" helmet would be unthikable in Sparta?

Kind regards

[Giannis K. Hoplite]

Exactly.I suppose the new phalanx formation was also a great aid in not killing your brother.We have examples of hoplites fighting against their own citizens without realising it,when the phalanx broke.That happened to the Athenians at least two times in the Peloponnesian war,one in Epipolae in Syracuse and another in Macedon.
Some times we know so little about certain things and yet we have a spesific image in our minds,and we think it was that way.For example who knows what a Spartan(or any) phalanx looked like.No one mentions any differences between Spartiates and any other army.Except the red cloaks that I-unlike the majority here-believe they wore it in battle and was the only thing the served uniformity to them.
Khairete
Giannis

[Giannis K. Hoplite]

Was the "attic" helmet actually identified as such in antiquity?I thought only the corinthian was called like this by the ancients.

[hoplite14gr]

There is an explanation of what happend at Delio as we found in our reserch.
Athenian epilektoi from Vravrona who sported sun an cresent on black shields were mistaken for Thespians (cresent on shields) and were killed.
Imagine blood and dust covering the sun pic and leaving the cresent ecposed and an inexperienced lad in his first fight who has to make a quick decision.


An now we know what a classical Spartan phalanx might look like.
We are uncertain about the Archaic times.

Kind regards

[Hoplitesmores]

What emblems should we paint for an epirus regiment?

[hoplite14gr]

What do you mean epirus regiment?
Please elaborate.

Kind regards

[Hoplitesmores]

Any special emblems used by in the Epirus region

[hoplite14gr]

Still under resaearch. sorry.
Kind regards

[Zenodoros]

Just some clarification for Spartan mora shield designs, exactly who wore which ones? In particular, which soldiers used the dokona as their emblem? Also, did the Spartan kings continue to wear the solar symbol (see avatar) after the Persian wars?

Thanks in advance!