Who amongst us military history fans has not admired since childhood the campaigns of Charles the Great - Charlemagne - both heroic and bloody! These were indeed dark ages, when death was always waiting. Some met death after barely their first breath, and those who survived birth often starved because of a poor harvest or a good one that was consumed by grasshoppers. Others, whether they be resting on feather beds or rotten straw, suffered in their thousands from the plague and smallpox that collected such a grim toll from mankind. It did indeed seem that darkness covered both the whole Earth and human souls. The light of Christianity was still to reach many parts of Europe, where idols continued to be worshipped.
Despite all this, the first weak shoots of civilisation, forerunner of a future dawn, were appearing through the marble ruins of the Roman Empire. These young shoots could easily have been trodden back into the dust, blood and mud by the hooves of Hungarian horses, Arabic camels and the boots of Viking raiders. Thank God that didn’t happen! It was the heavy shields of the Franks that protected the newly born Christian civilisation. This awkward shield, made of wooden planks fixed by iron stripes, repulsed the attacks of barbarians everywhere from the Oder and Saal, where Saxons and Slavic tribes launched their bold raids, to the Channel where the salty winds of fortune were blowing into the sails of Scandinavian pirates. The advance of Islam, which is so often discussed recently, first smashed on this shield on the field of Poitiers in 732 AD, where the warriors of Charles Martel "stood as snowy rocks and were freezing with cold". That’s how the Frank’s kingdom was protected and the Roman Empire - the cradle of western civilisation and two great European nations - was re-born.
It’s a pity that producers of figures in 1/72 scale have not touched the Franks’ campaigns, which were so important by their magnitude and consequences. Let this set correct that omission.
So, what did Frankish warriors look like? Rare pictures and miniatures from St. Gall Abbey that have survived from that time tell of naïve copying of the styles of late antiquity. This is not surprising, since the King of the Franks and Langobards, later the ruler and re-builder of the Roman Empire "the Great Charles, grey beard chieftain" - as he was called in The Song of Roland - wore in day-to-day life a flax shirt and sheepskin. Yet he considered himself equal to the Byzantine emperors and caliphs of Baghdad in their silk and satin clothes. Despite acute shortage of funds, the bodyguard and companions of the King were dressed and armed in the tradition of the late Roman Empire.
The noblemen followed the lead of the king in their dress. Muscle cuirasses and greaves for the legs were expensive items only affordable by the few highest-ranking noblemen, and we have modelled Charlemagne in this armour. In general, from the 3rd Century AD to the start of the Hundred Years War, armour was of the lamella type - fish-scale or sheet protection that was less reliable but easier and cheaper to manufacture. Even this type of armour was not cheap, and a full suit of armour for a Frankish warrior including sword, shield, helmet, spear and armour cost several dozen cows, a fortune at the time. The hauberk had been introduced long before, and was even known to the legionnaires of the Roman Republic, so the Franks must have known of it, but they seem to have rarely used it as no miniatures survive depicting them being worn. Possibly this was due to the complexity of their manufacture and their cost, and for this reason only two of our 24 Frankish figures are wearing them, including one depicting Roland blowing his horn.
Having said all that, we should not forget that the overwhelming majority of Franks (who would have been peasant militia) wore little or no protective armour at all. The sword was an almost inaccessible luxury for the common people, who used axes, bows, slings and the characteristic spears with the crossbeam as the main weapons of the army of the Carolingians. The most affordable and common defensive weapons were shields - diamond shaped or more often circular, and armour - quilted or made of plaited leather. All of these are depicted in our new set. The slinger, the militiaman in sandals with a short sword and the warrior in a helmet with a cross and one foot on a stone are undoubtedly of peasant origin. In contrast, the warriors wearing conical helmets and scale armour definitely belong to the heavy infantry recruited from the middle class population. To stress the Christian spirit of Charles’ warriors, we have included in the set a monk with a bible and a cross in his hands calling the Christ-loving warriors to battle. The dragon-bearer in his late-antiquity armour is worthy of special mention. A dragon on a pole was a Roman cavalry banner since the time of Trajan. Later the Byzantine army adopted it, and the Franks, who rightfully considering themselves descendants of Rome, took this symbol of a warrior’s valour from Byzantium.
Also it’s worth mentioning that the age of Charlemagne was a transitional period in the organisational structure of early medieval armies from numerous but poorly trained infantry to professional cavalrymen, close predecessors of future knights. It was these cavalrymen that were the main fighting force of the Carolingians, yet we have not released any mounted figures as we hope to release a separate cavalry set in the near future. The success of this set will decide how quickly the second set is released.
The Northmen, who were later to become one of the major foes of the Franks, deserve a separate mention. Carried by the wind across the seas, they sailed the World in search of booty and glory. It goes without saying that these sea vagabonds were the best warriors of the early Middle Ages. They had little choice - the relatively infertile soil of Scandinavia could hardly feed the growing population and they had to fight or die together with their wives and children. Cold fury streamed out of their eyes. In battle, they attacked their enemies like a storm from the North. "Lord deliver us from the fury of the Northmen" could be heard in churches and cathedrals all over frightened Europe, and their bloody trail was seen from Palestine to the North American continent, which was unknown to Europe at the time. Behind these men came the sagas, beautiful literature surviving through the ages to our own time which praised plundering, mercenaries and black deeds. While the Franks were at the peak of their power, the Vikings didn’t dare to loot the shores of their empire, but as soon as the descendants of Charles began tearing the mighty empire to pieces they began raiding once more. They frequently visited the outskirts of Paris itself, but even then they faced resistance. The speedy but small drakkars couldn’t carry a large army plus their horses, so the Franks were able to muster larger forces despite their kingdom being in disarray.
The Viking’s armament was mainly light. Conical or round riveted helmets, big flat circular or more rarely rectangular shields, sometimes a hauberk and in very rare cases scale armour was preferred. Not all had a sword, though it was not a rarity. Spears, war axes and hammers (the favourite war tool of Scandinavian sagas) together with wooden bludgeons were the most popular weapons. Some Vikings, berserks in particular, preferred to fight in just a shirt or with their torso naked. All of these have been depicted in our set.
Before us this theme was touched upon by a Spanish company, but not with great success since the figures were taken from the Airfix set of Ancient Britons. A good set has been released in a limited run by the Ukrainian company Orion, which partially utilised Marx’s figures in 1/32 scale with some original figures added. We tried to make the Nordic warriors not in the way we have got used to seeing them on beer bottle labels, but rather as they were in their austere reality. Unfortunately we had to withdraw 2 figures from one of the sprues because they were 'locked' in the mould, for which we ask you to accept our apologies. We hope that the rest of the figures will compensate for those that are missing. The 30 painted figures that are shown on our site give you an impression of how they could look upon purchase by our fellow-collectors. The set proved to be a difficult one to produce, and we had to spend a lot of money, time and effort to achieve an acceptable level of quality.
Our next sets of Army of Joan of Arc, Army of Henry V and others won’t have frames, which often distorted sprues when they were cooling. We will also pay greater attention to the details of the weaponry. The set will be released in a bronze metallic colour and will contain 45 figures. The initial production run is 7,000 sets.