Refurbishing 28mm Late Romans

Among the numerous boxes of unpainted figures and box files of old veterans that had not seen the light of day for years I found when emptying our loft was a box file of 28mm Late Romans. Inspired by my recent game against Gordon with the Byzantines I thought I'd refurbish them.

The figures were mainly infantry manufactured by Garrison probably in the early 80's and were some of the newer figures Garrison produced at the time. I don't think they are available any more though 'The Eastern Garrison' blog seems to be run by the owner now. There were a few rather badly painted Hinchliffe cavalry as well which were not some of Hinchliffe's better figures so perhaps that's why they were badly painted!

The original paint job was based on information in the WRG 'Armies and Enemies of Imperial Rome', published in 1981, which I still possess:

At the time this was pretty much the only source of information on the Late Roman army. It included several pages of Late Roman shield designs for numerous units which I distinctly remember colouring in (they were black and white with the colours in the text!) then figuring out which ones I was capable of painting:

As with the other ancient in more ways than one armies I've refurbished the army was actually in a reasonable condition. Many spears had been dropped but most of them were in the box. The original gloss varnish had yellowed considerably in some areas and the basing did not fit in with ADLG.

Some of the figures before refurbishment:

The first refurbished unit, Auxilia Palatina 'Iovii Seniores'.The original light blue shields had yellowed badly so I repainted them, matt varnished them and rebased for ADLG:

Another Auxila Palatina, this time the 'Batavi Seniores'. I seem to remember that they were one of my favourite units in the army. These were just varnished and rebased:

The first of the Legions, Legio Comitatensis 'Germaniciani Iuniores' and Legio Palatina 'Thebaei'. Again just varnished and rebased:

Two more Legions, Legio Palatina 'Octaviani' and Legio Comitatensis 'Septimani Seniores'. The Octaviani shields are still a little yellow but don't look too bad:

The last of the Legions, this time Legio Comitatensis 'Matiarii Iuniores' varnished and rebased:

Next up was the Hinchcliffe heavy cavalry. I don't think they were painted as a specific unit. Originally they had dark blue cloaks which made them look very dull and for some reason the varnish was very glossy making them distinctly unappealing. I painted the cloaks a lavender colour to brighten them up a bit, re-varnished them matt and rebased them. I think they look a lot better now though I'm still not that keen on the figures:

The final unit was a couple of bases of light cavalry. Rather like the heavy cavalry these had red cloaks with thick black lining and single colour tunics. For these I repainted the cloaks red with a dark red shade, highlighted the tunics in off-white and added some decoration in purple to match the Auxiliary infantry. After varnishing and basing I think they look okay now:

All the Legionary units were originally 12 figures strong so I have enough figures for two more Legionary bases though they would have mixed shields. It is tempting to add some better cavalry for the army and some cataphracts but 'as is' the army is usable now with some additions from the Byzantines and Huns.

All I need to do now is arrange a game for them!