Bronze Age Chariot, Wargames Foundry - Part 1 of 2

The miniatures featured in the following posts are quite unusual for this blog for a couple of reasons. One is that although I'm interested in ancient history (on my travels I've visited places such as Mycenae and Troy, locations associated with these figures) I'm not that interested in playing games set in the period. Another reason is that because, as far as I can tell, these figures have never actually been available to buy from the manufacturer, Wargames Foundry. These figures were painted around four years ago.

It was only after my brother reminded me about them that I had a rummage for the photographs. Eventually after a long search I found them. The models depict Mycenaean Bronze Age chariots. I say this because the models weren't labelled but appear to be based on an illustration by Angus McBride from an Osprey book 'The Mycenaeans c.1650–1100 BC (ELITE 130) an image from which can be seen [here].

In the famous siege of Troy the armour worn by the warriors would have been very similar to an example discovered at Dendra.  It's interesting to note that when the warrior was carrying a shield the only part of the body left exposed would have been the back of the leg i.e. the Achilles heel region.

Note the boar tusk decoration on the helmet.

Wargames Foundry have a massive range of figures and they were pioneers of the wargaming miniature market, being an early employer of the Perry brothers for example. I think these particular models got misplaced (literally by the looks of it) during the management changes that took place over the last few years when the son of the owner, Bryan Ansell, eventually took charge. 

As seems to be a regular pattern within the wargaming world that for a period companies become almost social pariahs for some reason or the other. A few years ago Wargames Foundry received an awful lot of negative comments on certain sites whenever they were mentioned, mainly it seems for their price/packaging structure and shipping costs. With the change of management it seems they have restored their image/reputation and now can be seen regularly at wargame shows.

Despite this golden age of affordable plastic miniatures Foundry still produce some very attractive and sometimes obscure metal figures. I recently purchased from them some very nice 17th century civilians to decorate my tabletop for ECW games.