Alexander

Just over 20 years ago I helped out on a school trip one of my kids was on to the National Gallery in London. Whilst on a short break from my charges I came across this painting by Paolo Verenese - 'The Family of Darius Before Alexander', painted around 1570.

What I loved about it was the fact that it was a classical theme, but everyone was in contemporary (for 1570) dress, including, of course, the soldiers. Its the same with this version of the same scene by Bellucci, from the Ashmolean:

And in a wild moment an idea struck me. It would be fun to do an Alexander wargames army, with all of the 'correct' troop types but depicted with 16th century figures. 

Naturally, being me, this thought passed out of my mind for the next 20 years, but I was reminded of it last week and also reminded that I now actually had a box of ransom 15th/16th century figures in a box from when I did my Early Swiss army a few years ago. I dug them out, along with the DBA Alexandrian Macedonian army-list, and had a look to see what I could do. My first thought was that it would be a fun HOTT army, and I was able to put this together:

The army consists of:

1 x Hero General @ 4AP (Alexander)

1 x Knights @ 2AP (Companions)

1 x Rider @ 2AP (Light Cavalry)

6 x Spears @ 2AP (Phalanx)

1 x Blade or Warband @ 2AP (Hypaspists)

2 x Lurkers or 1 x Shooter @2AP (Skirmishing missile troops)

I found some extra figures to add in extras for the HOTT army or to allow it to be run as a legitimate DBA army. Almost. See below.

So here's Alexander, in full-plate armour. Ideally I'd like a figure that's a little more energetic in pose, but I had to work with what I had. I'll swap it for something better if I find anything.

The mounted troops. I didn't have any suitable figures to be ersatz Thessalian cavalry, something my DBA version will need and which I will organise at some stage. But I had knights for the companions, and some mounted crossbowmen for the light cavalry.

The phalangites. These were the most work as they all needed their pikes replacing with something sturdier. 

The Hypaspists. I can't remember what they're supposed to look like, but the DBA list as then as 4Ax, so they're kind of not quite light troops but not heavies either. In my HOTT Inca army the 4Ax are classed as blades, but I based these with a more irregular look and would probably run them as warband in order to give the army a bad-going capability.

The spare element is firstly so that the warband could have a second rank and secondly because one of the DBA options is 4Ax Thracians.

Missile troops - you get the option of some archer lurkers or shooter handgunners.

And the optional elements for DBA or variants of the HOTT army - some artillery and some horse-archers at the back, plus some 'Thracians' and an element of psiloi in the form of crossbowment at the front.

For the complete DBA army I'd need some equivalent of the Thessalian cavalry and something for the mercenary Greek hoplites.

Anyway, it was a silly idea from 20 years ago that used up spare figures I had around and took very little time in terms of painting - I had to do the new pikes, paint a gun and rebase everything, but that was it. And now I have a new HOTT army plus a DBA army that will annoy purists.