Author Topic: Joker's Osprey Topic - hundreds of pics! (Read 20700 times)

Joker86 · « **on:** January 29, 2012, 12:43:26 am »

Hi there!

The discussion about new armour brought me to the idea to post the coloured plates from my Osprey book collection. These books are more or less the modern reference for military history for everyone who is not a real, dedicated expert but rather only interested or very interested. They try to depict military technology as accurately as possible, so you can basically treat them as sources for any historical investigation.

This topic can have several purposes. I can serve your entertainment, it can inspire you for a certain style of equipment, but it can also serve as base for creating new items, if one of you is capable of modelling and texturing. There are some really amazing pictures among them, and some warriors look really badass, for example the blue Norman Knight.

If you want further information, I will see what I can do

European Medieval Armies

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German Medieval Armies 1000-1300

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German Medieval Armies 1300-1500

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French medieval Armies 1000-1300

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French Armies of the 100 Years War

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Italian Medieval Armies 1000-1300

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Italian Medieval Armies 1300-1500

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Armies at Agincourt

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Armies at Crecy and Poitiers

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Armies of Medieval Burgundy?

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Armies of the German Peasant War

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Armies of the Hussite Wars

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The Swiss at War

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The Landsknechts

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The War of Roses

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The Scottish and Welsh at War

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Scandinavian Medieval Armies 1000-1300

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Scandinavian Medieval Armies 1300-1500

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Armies of the Scandinavian Baltic Crusades

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The Vikings

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Saxon, Viking and Norman

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The Normans

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The Age of Charlemagne

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Polish Medieval Armies

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The Venetian Empire

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El Cid and the Reconquista

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The Conquistadores

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Knights at Tournament

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Medieval Siege Warfare

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The Crusades

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Armies of the Crusades

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The Knights of Christ

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Armies of Medieval Russia 750-1250

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Armies of Medieval Russia 1250-1500

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Byzantine Armies 886-1118

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Byzantine Armies 1118-1461

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The Varangian Guard

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Hungary and the Fall of Eastern Europe

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Steppe Warriors

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The Mongols

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Armies of Islam

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Armies of the Caliphates

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Armies of the Muslim Conquest

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Saladin and the Saracens

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The Mamluks

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The Moors

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The Age of Tamerlan

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Armies of the Ottoman Turks

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Joker86 · « **Reply #1 on:** January 29, 2012, 12:46:15 am »

-Reserved -

Joker86 · « **Reply #2 on:** January 29, 2012, 12:52:40 am »

Quote from: Joker86 on January 29, 2012, 12:46:15 am

-Reserved -

Perhaps there is yet more to come?

Zimke Zlovoljni · « **Reply #3 on:** January 29, 2012, 02:53:46 am »

Thanks for this mr Joker ;)

Adalwulf · « **Reply #4 on:** January 29, 2012, 04:00:08 am »

Agreed good stuff. +1

Christo · « **Reply #5 on:** January 29, 2012, 04:27:24 am »

Good stuff, indeed.

Ah, there is a Hungarian section, Just too many pictures and I got confused.

Joker86 · « **Reply #6 on:** January 29, 2012, 04:28:23 am »

11th spoiler from the bottom?

Christo · « **Reply #7 on:** January 29, 2012, 04:29:14 am »

Yeah, got it, post re-edited.

I'm a bit tired, it seems.

visitors can't see pics , please register or login

By the way, the armor on the left guy on horseback, is totally identical to mine ingame.

So cool.

Stylin_ATS · « **Reply #8 on:** January 29, 2012, 09:32:04 am »

I can certainly see where the inspiration for many of our current armors came from. I'd love to see more Magyar, Byzantine and Ottoman stuff in game.

dodnet · « **Reply #9 on:** January 29, 2012, 10:21:16 am »

Quote from: Joker86 on January 29, 2012, 12:43:26 am

German Medieval Armies 1300-1500
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The prove that we germans invented breast piercing!

Kansuke · « **Reply #10 on:** January 29, 2012, 11:51:51 pm »

This is awesome, thank you.

Angantyr · « **Reply #11 on:** January 30, 2012, 02:21:25 am »

Thank you for your time Joker, I own most of these Osprey books myself but it's very nice to have all the illustrations gathered in one place; and especially here where many players might find it a source of inspiration for their characters.

People should be aware though that despite being generally historically accurate by being based on primary sources, Osprey artists have a degree of artistic freedom, and the authors are not always equally well-informed on a given subject (Medieval Scandinavian Armies as a case in point, nothing wrong with the illustrations however). It's usually pretty high quality for its format, though, and in regards to historical illustrations it doesn't get much better.

Joker86 · « **Reply #12 on:** January 31, 2012, 10:24:03 am »

I can't really judge this, as I am not that into historical matters to be able to find "mistakes" in the illustrations (or books, what's wrong with Scandinavian Medieval Armies?), but I guess even if an illustrator takes use of his freedom, there will surely have been a guy who looked like this. I think in the middle ages showing off and looking cool was as important as it was nowadays, perhaps even more, so if someone had the money to look differently, I guess there have been plenty who took advantage of this.

At least considering knights and mercenaries.

Angantyr · « **Reply #13 on:** January 31, 2012, 03:46:05 pm »

When you do these things the obvious approach would be to look at the various primary sources, be it archaeological finds, contemporary illustrations (for example in an illustrated bible, a church painting, a tapestry etc.) or as in the example of Medieval Scandinavia some of the written material from the historical record describing in detail what equipment the different levies aswell as nobles are required to muster with.

In the case of 'Scandinavian Medieval Armies' some of the best sources are completely ignored, like the 'Konungs skuggsjá', 'Codex Holmiensis' and the 'Hirðskrá', and some of what is written is pure speculation, based on absolutely nothing as far as I can tell (no sources provided). Much of the archaeological record is ignored, too, though admittedly some chapters are of a good enough quality. Let us also not forget the format we're talking here, with so few pages (especially in the case of 'Scandinavian' armies where you have to cover three seperate kingdoms) you are hard pressed as an author to make it fit into one manual.

Same goes for Osprey's take on Vikings, here some frankly wild theories, for example about 'ringborge/Viking circle forts', are put forward, again completely unfounded, and one can only wonder if these authors do not even make the attempt at looking at some of the excellent material that can be found, for example Else Roesdahl's updated version of 'Vikingernes Verden' which with its summary-style format fits that of Osprey's quite well - aswell as being well-documented and written by a leading authority on the subject.

But Osprey does have its merits as a small-format, pop-history publication; it's usually an excellent overview of many contemporary pictorial references (though sadly mostly in black and white) and as I said in my above post the modern illustrations are often of as good quality as it gets.

Bobthehero · « **Reply #14 on:** February 13, 2012, 03:39:20 am »

I approve of this thread, a lot.

Got ethe Maciejowski bible pictures too?

Author Topic: Joker's Osprey Topic - hundreds of pics! (Read 20700 times)

Joker86

Joker's Osprey Topic - hundreds of pics!

Joker86

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Joker86

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Zimke Zlovoljni

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Adalwulf

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Christo

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Joker86

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Christo

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Stylin_ATS

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dodnet

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Kansuke

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Angantyr

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Joker86

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Bobthehero

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