My Pomeranians are mostly built using plastic kits from Perry Miniatures. As I'm planning to build some cavalry, I'm figuring out what parts of Perry's Mounted Men at Arms 1450-1500 would work in my historical setting.
Note: I am not a professional historian, and what I write below are educated guesses of a hobbyist with the experience of a few days at a local university library.
Note 2: I'm checking historical accuracy for Pomerania only. The model kit by Perry may be perfectly historically accurate for other locations even when it doesn't match my own.
References
I'm going with two main references: the Siewert Granzin epitaph painting (aka the Grateful Dead painting) from Kołobrzeg (1492), that I already referenced for my Turm warband:
and the "Siege of Malbork" painting from Gdańsk (1482-1488) -- it's not the Duchy of Pomerania, but Pomerania nevertheless. I'm posting a detail photo below; the artwork was lost during World War 2:
Additionally, there's a Gdańsk painting from the same period depicting The Ship of the Church, with three armed saints (one, curiously, a woman). Likewise, it was lost during the war, and what we have is a colour reconstruction by Krzysztof Izdebski:
When it comes to late 15th century references for armed Pomeranian mounted knights (or, for that matter, for any kind of armed soldiers, mounted or not), that's basically it -- no other paintings survive, and we don't have anything of substance on frescoes or manuscript illustrations either.
So, let's check how Perry sprues compare to these.
Heads
1 is a half-visored sallet with a short tail a pointy top, that Wikipedia classifies as English-Burgundian style. Sallets in my references have predominantly rounded tops, so it's out.
2 is an armet-type helmet. Armets aren't really featured in my sources, so this one's out too (but may be very nice for Turnip).
3 is a lovely chaperon hat, sadly absent from my references, both the ones listed above and others, depicting mostly civilians.
4 is a bare head with what seems like a pretty basic hairstyle. Generally, a knight wouldn't charge to battle without a head protection, but it could work for a miniature in a more leisurely setting.
5 is an open Italian-style sallet (or perhaps a barbute) with no visor. The angled corners of the helmet above the brow don't really appear for my sources, so it's Turnip rather than Pomerania.
6 is a German-style sallet with an eye slit. Not a common design for my sources, but it could be argued that a helmet like that is worn by a knight in the background of the Grateful Dead. It qualifies.
7 is a half-visored, long-tailed sallet. Visor sides look iffy when compared to the paintings, and the tail is a bit long for what I have in my references.
8, 9 and 10 are short-tailed, round-topped, half-visored sallets with plumes. The overall shapes are really good, the visors raised in the middle are also a great match. High-placed hinges aren't perfect when compared to iconography -- but it's hard to find surviving or reconstructed sallets with low hinges like in the artwork; it's possible that the artists somewhat simplified the real helmets. Plumes don't match the references, but there's nothing easier than cutting plumes and reusing them for Turnip. Generally, these are good; and it's even better that helmets like these are easily found in other Perry kits.
11 and 12 are, respectively, an armet and a great bascinet -- both nowhere to be found in my references.
Bodies and arms
Left arms are moulded together with bodies, and right arms have matching designs, so arms go together with torsos here.
1: everything except for the gauntlet is nearly a perfect match for the praying knight in the Grateful Dead painting. The pauldrons, with their curious "vertical plate over horizontal folds" design, for all I know, seem to be based on the tomb effigy of English knight Ralph Fitzherbert. To be converted, perhaps.
2 is an armour covered with a livery coat. There are a few people in my references wearing fabrics over armour, not this kind of fabric, though.
3: with a left-sided rondel, a simple "folded" pauldron and equally simple rounded tassets this one looks really close to my references. No conversion needed, it's in.
4: A Space-Marine sized pauldron and a leather strap on the breastplate: this looks like a lovely and accurate Italian-style harness, sadly absent from my reference pictures.
Weapons
The lances in the Perry kit have a characteristic cone-shaped parts behind the hand (I mean, butts? Can you have a butt this long?), while both my references and the excellent if somewhat geographically remote Wolfegg Hausbuch depict lances with more complex shapes. So some cutting and filing may be in order, although one could argue that the lance of St Gregory from the Ship of the Church painting has specifically that shape, quite heavily stylized by the artist:
Swords are fine, and one-handed swords are particularly welcome as these are surprisingly rare in Perry kits and quite common in historical record. The lance is still the weapon of choice here, but swords were ubiquitous sidearms and I may use drawn swords for foot miniatures or a leader figure or two.
The single spear should work well as a banner pole -- and maybe also as a lance (a trip to a library may be in order; the shape of banner-spears and lances seems like something that Tadeusz Grabarczyk would mention in his book on Polish mercenary cavalry).
I don't see any matching maces, hammers or axes in my references.
Horse armour
It's out. No horse armour in my references whatsoever -- and it's not like the artists were above overarming the men they depicted, quite the contrary.
Should I buy another kit instead?
Not really if I'm a hard plastic fan (and I am). Perry Agincourt Knights dated for 1415 are outmoded by the 1450s, and Wargames Atlantic Renaissance Cavalry dated for, well, the Renaissance are in the far future from the point of view of Pomerania 1471.
Besides the bits that are really close to my references, there's also a lot of the parts that could reasonably end up in Pomerania in the late 15th century (in the end, the Siege of Malbork painting depicts a footman in a decidedly Italian tau barbute helmet; trade happens).
And what parts don't go to Pomerania will end up in the muddy fields of Cist for Turnip28 builds.
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