Painted Boyar Sotnia (updated)

 Finally painted my Boyar Sotnia miniatures (some have nasty misprints but still I was able to paint them) - all 4 sets of Boyar Sons in da flesh:

More to come, stay tuned and check these miniatures here in my store.

New bundle - Boyar Sotnia

Save some money on a new muscovite cavalry with a new bundle - Boyar Sotnia. 

It allows you to buy all 4 new Boyar Sons sets (12 various miniatures in total) at once with a 20% discount. 

As usual, you can buy it in my store.

Stay tuned, more to come!

New release - Muscovite mounted command

Happy to announce new set - muscovite mounted command.

Set includes:

- Boyar from a proud and wealthy family, unarmored, on a decorated horse.

- General (Voivode) in expensive full set of eastern-style armor.

- Cossack leader (Ataman) in chainmail, who can also represent lesser boyar or voivode.

- Boyar son in padded armor and misyurka helmet, bearing noble boyar's personal standard (prapor). This model also has alternative version without banner cloth, so you can print ang glue any other banner you wish (or use this miniature as a bodyguard or a mounted boyar son with long spear).

You can buy these colorful guys here. Stay tuned, more to come!

Preview - Mounted standard-bearer

Finished 2nd model for the muscovite command set. It's a banner bearer, who holds so called "boyar prapor" - personal standard of a wealthy noble (not an army standard given by the tsar himself). 

This young boyar son or boyar's servant (kholop) rides fine horse in a decorated barding, weas a suit of padded armor and a decorated misyurka helmet showing high status and wealth of the banner's owner. Also set will include a version of this miniature with an empty banner-pole so you can print and glue any banner you want.

Stay tuned, more to come!

From servant tartars to boyar sons

 

Interesting detail - servant tartars slowly merged with other feudal cavalry starting from the end of 16th century. For example, many tartars changed their religion to orthodox christian, and became usual muscovites of tartar origin - former servant tartars were registered as boyar sons. Many of the muscovite and later imperial russian noble families had their roots in tartar families that decided to serve tsar and changed their religion.

As tartars were good at archery, many of them continued to actively use bows as primary weapon till the end of the 17th century, when other boyar sons absolutely forgot how to use it.

Here I took a short break to paint and base some of my test prints: tartars and boyar sons.

Stay tuned, more to come!

New release - Unarmored boyar sons with pistols

Year 2025 is closing and I'm happy enough to close it with a new release - this time it's muscovite boyar sons with pistols!

Pistols were first introduced in muscovite tsardom in 1590s but were extremely rare. However in 1630-50s quite a lot of boyar sons were armed with only 1 pistol and no other ranged weapons!

Here you get 3 unarmored feudal cavalrymen 15mm figures fighting in close quarters with pistols and sabers only.

You can buy stl files in my store

And wish you all a Happy New Year! Stay tuned, more to come!

New release - Unarmored boyar sons with carbines

Here you get 3x 15mm muscovite feudal cavalrymen with carbines and no armor (although one is wearing eastern style "shishak" helmet with custom-made chainmail neck protection).

In fact this is how most of boyar sons looked like in 17th century (many of them also had a pistol, not shown here). Carbine was a cheap, quite effective weapon, and required much less training than bow to become a skilled shooter.

As usual you can buy stl files in my store. And don't forget about 10% winter sale discount!

Stay tuned, more to come!

Historical notes: who are the Boyar Sons

 By the way, who are Boyar Sons?

Those who are not familiar with muscovite military history may not understand this term correctly. Speaking short: it was a form of servitude in Muscovte tsardom - tsar granted some person noble status + some land (with villages and peasants) and that person was obliged to serve in regular military campaign as armed and armored cavalryman as well as bring 1-6 armed (and at least partly armored) servants, usually former peasants skilled with bow and melee weapons. More servants and better equipment boyar son had - more was annual compensation from the tsar.

That land was called "pomestie" and the type of cavalry was called "pomiestna cavalry" - made of the land owners and their armed servants. This model was typical for feudal forces, Ottoman sipahi used the same organization principles.

INTERESTING FACT: we still don't know why these men were called "boyar sons" because not all of them were in fact from boyar families. But this word was really used from late medieval up to 18th century.

If that feudal warrior missed campaign or regular gathering of boyar sons, tsar could take granted land from him. This system worked quite well up to the times of Ivan the Terrible, whose 20-years war with all neighbours and harsh politics threw most boyar sons into poverty. That's why at first boyar sons could not afford armed servants, then could not afford personal body armor and ocasionally even could not afford a horse. There still was some percent of rich boyars from rich families who had master-crafted weapons, good armor and a number of armed servants, but their number was very low.

On battlefield boyar sons fought in typical eastern style, riding back and forth, shooting, flanking and if neccessary charging. They also were able to fight on foot, for example, assaulting enemy positions. On favorable conditions they sometimes even defeated much stronger enemies like mercenary reiters or even winged hussars but usually they preferred to evade them.

P.S.

I've painted test batch of my 1st older set of boyar sons:

They were printed with a lot of misprints and errors and it required a nice dose of greenstuff for them to look like this.

Stay tuned, more to come!

Release - Boyar Sons unarmored with bows

New set is ready for purchase! These are bow-armed unarmored boyar sons. In this set you get 3x 15mm miniatures that represent the largest part of the muscovite feudal cavalry in 16th or first quarter of the 17th century before bows were totally replaced with firearms.

On the southern steppe frontier bows were still present for most of the 17th century and you can add some bow armed figures to your units even if all other riders are carbine-armed.

Various types of body armor were too expensive for most boyar sons (whose fiefdoms were usually small and poor) and often lost on campaigns with the capture of camps and wagon trains. That's why typical muscovite cavalryman weared his everyday dress as his only protection.

You can buy stl files for this set in my store as usual. Stay tuned, more to come!

Release - Boyar Sons in padded armor

 I'm happy to announce first set of new boyar sons mounted on updated steppe horses.

Here you receive 3x 15mm muscovite feudal cavalrymen dressed in padded armor and armed with bows, sabers and axes. One of the riders wears old model "shelom" helmet wit a small flag on top and added side face guards for extra protection.

Padded armor ("tegyliai") was a popular choice of defensive equipment among muscovite boyars and their retinue in 16th century. It was lightweight and sturdy enough to save its owner from arrows or saber cuts - ideal to fight another steppe cavalry like tartars. At the beginning of the 1600s we see the decline of its usage and in the middle of 17th century it's almost absent, though it is still seen in personal armories of wealthy muscovite nobles - often these sets were made of expensive cloth and brightly colored.

You can buy STL-files of these models here.

Stay tuned, more to come!

Boyar Sons - first preview

My friends who also play 17th century wargames often ask me - when I'm going to start working on the cornerstone moscovite units. First of all, it's about boyar sons cavalry. 

Well, let's not disappoint them - here is a first draft of a boyar son. This one is quite wealthy as he has a decorated helmet, but otherwise old-school cavalryman. He doesn't have any firearm, only bow.

Stay tuned, more boyar sons are yet to come!