Slitherine

In organizing my Spanish army, I want them to make a decent appearance on the tabletop. However, putting together the numbers involved in regards to shields is presenting a painting dilemna.

Which of the following should I do:

A.) find 24 patterns I like and then paint each BG's shields in a slightly different hue?
B.) find 8 patterns or so and paint them in at least 3 different color sets.
C.) identify each BG by a single shield pattern.

Having tried to accomplish A in theory and falling short of 24 adaptable patterns, I'm currently leaning towards C.

I don't like repeating shield patterns inside a BG unless its for the entire BG and I don't like having to dip too far into celtic designs to come up with enough unique patterns as I'd save that for the celtiberian mercs. The minis I have ready to paint are CB and are closer to true 15s so the shield's painting surface is small. I know this comes down to taste, but what hard evidence is available for groups within ancient spain and their shield patterns? The one ancient work I have seen showed a similar pattern for everyone. I don't know, it would be interesting to get some input and thoughts from fellow gamers on the subject.

So what do you think would cut the best appearance and stay in the realm of historical accuracy?

Best I have seen for 'barbarians' is to run with similar color schemes, but with different patterns. The colors distinguish the unit, the varied patterns keep it irregular.

The main depictions that have been found of Spanish shields represent geometrical forms. You can visit this Celtiberian shield in the Spanish Archeological Museum :



http://man.mcu.es/exposiciones/exposici ... nente.html

I guess that pectorals might have some designs in common with the shields or, at least, they can serve as an inspiration:



I think that you can have thousands of different combinations of geometrical forms: it is just a matter of imagination, although I would not discard the fact that some of them might be repeated. After all, it is believed that those geometrical forms were representations of the Earth and the Sun.

In any case I would not go for C and have the same design in all the shields as it does not seem to be very accurate in historical terms. Usually in Ancient times every soldier, and Spanish troops were not an exception, used to provide their own military equipment and this equipment was inherited, so I would not expect much uniformity in them. Some additional information is available here:

http://www.mastienos.org/historia/armas-iberos.htm

I went with fairly bright colors to identify battle groups with mine
My Spanish serve only as Roman allies - so I do not have a full army of them

For my Iberians I'm going for a very uniform design / colour scheme with minimal variation. Red / black / white in set combinations.

For the Celtiberians I'm going for much more variety in colours and designs - manly green / yellow variations.