Hundred Years War - DBA

[paulr]

With my Punic War project rapidly approaching completion I'm starting to do some painting research for my next project the Hundred Years War

I've order enough figures for 8 DBA armies
    IV/16 Scotland
    IV/57 Low Countries
    IV/62 100 Years War English (2)
    IV/64 Medieval French (2)
    IV/74 Free Company & Armagnac
    IV/76 Early Burgundian

I'd be very interested if anyone can point me at online resources for painting these forces, particularly livery colours for the more 'common' soldiers

[Leon]

Those are all being picked up today so hopefully they'll be with you soon!

[paulr]

 

Just seen an email from the courier company, estimated delivery date is 25 May

The latest update is that the package Departed Facility in TEESSIDE - UK Thursday, May 14, 2020 at 18:39

[paulr]

I'd be very interested if anyone can point me at online resources for painting these forces, particularly livery colours for the more 'common' soldiers

[Lord Speedy of Leighton]

Try this
https://blog.vexillia.me.uk/2018/09/war-of-roses-livery-colours-database.html

[mmcv]

As far as I'm aware there's not a lot of contemporary details on it, so you could make a lot of it up as long as you follow general guidelines. Typically they would favour bright colours, usually one or two primary colours from the lord's coat of arms. So if you find a noble you want to represent and get their cost of arms, then you can generally pick the colours from the arms and use that. For instance the Tudor colours were green and white so the common soldiers would have livery of half green, half white. The English royal colours were the quartered red and blue so that's an easy one too, or the red with the three yellow lions. It seems the St George cross was common too, white with a red cross.

Blue, white and yellow go a long way for the French. They also favoured crosses, white I believe, on a solid coloured background, typically red or blue. Solid colours with emblems all over them seem to have been used too, at this scale that could be something like a red with white dots, or blue with yellow dots. The latter would work well for the French royal colours.

http://www.hundredyearswar.com/Books/History/Livery_a.htm

Pretty good breakdown of picking livery colours from costs of arms: https://www.reddit.com/r/heraldry/comments/c7ig7k/your_livery_colours_and_you_a_graphical_guide/

For particular nobles I came across this, though not sure how accurate it is:

https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/1505/0474/files/MED_FLAGS.pdf

Perhaps more reliably, the college of arms has some good examples from Agincourt:

https://www.college-of-arms.gov.uk/news-grants/news/item/119-the-battle-of-agincourt

This seems interesting from the French side:

http://jean-claude.colrat.pagesperso-orange.fr/index-angl.htm

Given the length of the period in question things changed a lot. In earlier periods of the war solid colours would have been more common and a less uniform appearance overall, but over time brightly coloured livery became a way for lords to flaunt their wealth and power and they became increasingly elaborate. I would guess that as the war progressed and the king's gained a bit more power, more troops would be in their colours than the individual lords, bit I'm not entirely sure on that one.

I suppose the question is do you want your armies to have a fairly consistent theme throughout, e.g. one English all in green and white halves, or white and red cross, or in red and blue quarters. A French in blue and white crosses or yellow dots. Or do you want a more varied "every lord for himself" approach with a bit of variety and different colours and styles for each unit. You can make things up a bit for this as it's just not as well documented as is say the War of the Roses.

This site had some good info on picking colours, e.g. http://www.fleurdelis.com/tinctures.htm

Hope this helps a little! Looking forward to seeing what you do with them.

[mmcv]

Also just for kicks:

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-tNQVwvuW0" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-tNQVwvuW0</a>

[paulr]

Warning a number of Lego figures and horses were harmed during the making of the above movie
I recognised some of the heraldry in the movie

Thanks MMCV, some useful links there including some I hadn't come across

My current thinking for the English & French is to identify appropriate knights, probably from Agincourt as it is famous and near the middle of the period, and each will then have a retinue of men-at-arms and bowmen. I'll include some red crosses for the English and white for the French

I'll do something similar with the Burgundians and the Free Company

The Low Countries will be focused on a number of guilds and the Scots will probably be hodden grey with flags from appropriate cities/counties/clans

[mmcv]

Sounds like a good plan!

[Lord Speedy of Leighton]

Scots are irregular, so a mix of dull colours but also yellows (boiled onion skins) were common.

[paulr]

Sounds good for the Scots Lemmey, I did quite a few 'saffrons' in Pierre the Shy's ECW Scots

A certain package "Departed Facility in LONDON-HEATHROW - UK Friday, May 15, 2020 at 20:07"

[paulr]

A certain package looks to be taking an interesting route through time and space

Customs status updated CINCINNATI HUB, OH - USA Friday, May 15, 2020 at 18:43

[paulr]

A certain package has arrived at Sort Facility CINCINNATI HUB - USA Saturday, May 16, 2020 at 02:55

Pierre the Shy has kindly lent me his copy of Armies of the Middle Ages, volume 1 by Ian Heath

I forgot to bring his copy of Armies of the Macedonian and Punic Ware also be Ian Heath so I could return it

[mmcv]

I've been reading Ian Heath's armies of the sixteenth century (Americas) lately. Lots of good information. Hopefully the middle ages one will be helpful for you.

[FierceKitty]

The one I sent you?