“When they strike they inflict a dreadful wound, deadly where it lighteth” – SAGA Scots project pt.3

Greetings cattle thieves and vagabonds! Welcome back to another article covering the muster of my Scots warband for SAGA. In the previous part I covered the bulk of my army, namely the Kern and Irish runaways, seeking fame and fortune within the ranks of a Galloglass raiding force. In this article I will show you my first unit of painted Galloglass, as well as talking about the material culture of the Scottish mercenaries roaming the countryside of Ireland and the Hebrides.

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  A unit of Galloglass ready to wreck havoc and steal your livestock!

Bro, do you even use pants?
The Galloglass did not distinguish themselves from the Irish locals in terms of clothing. Instead they followed what can be viewed as a form of ‘pan-Gaelic style’ consisting of saffron coloured shirts and kyrtles. Depictions also show warriors using the ever so characterful Irish smock or jacket with wide arms – perfect for hiding daggers and a bad temper on a rainy day. I painted my Galloglass using quite earthy and natural colors, adding hints of of blue-gray to complement the yellowish brown of their coats and shirts. Sadly the source material is a bit scarce, so I had to rely on later depictions of Galloglass for reference. Here’s the excellent depiction of Irish “War men”, or Galloglass, that Albrecht Dürer made in 1521. I actually tried to paint the guy with the cape using quite a strong red (with a yellow/black checkers pattern) but felt that he stood out too much from the rest so repainted him using the same dark blue-gray.

Sources also indicate that fighting bare-footed and bare-legged (‘redshank’) was common due to the nature of the landscape and terrain in Ireland. The miniatures from Antediluvian captures this with great accuracy, and Paul Hicks has made a wonderful job with all of the models, especially the ones depicted above!

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“Double-bladed hatches, almost sharper than razors, fixed on shafts of more than ordinary lenght”
The arms and armor worn by the Galloglass varied from individual to individual but some general points can be made. Drawing upon a huge range of effigies, scupltures, and illustrations, Fergus Cannan argues that Galloglass for the most part were used as heavy infantry on the battlefield – wearing padded gambesons, mail hauberks and continental styled helmets like bacinets. There are no sources that tell of visored helmets which reinforces the notion that the Galloglass fought on foot rather than mounted. Cannan further concludes that there was almost certainly an established import of armor from the European continent to Ireland, and that the Galloglass clans and families stockpiled mail shirts and helmets to arm their companies (Cannan, 2013, p.21). In 1428 the Archbishop of Armagh, John Swayne, describes a formation of around 3000 footmen (of which one third would be Galloglass) all clad in “aketon, haubergeon, pisane, [and] bacinet” (Cannan, 2013, p.19). This further reinforces the picture of Galloglass forming the heavily armed vanguard of the contemporary armies.

The Galloglass were equiped with a variety of weapons, but were especially known for their two-handed axes (called Spars or Sparths) – which reveal the imapct of the Nordic warrior culture on Scotland and the northern isles. The Dane axe naturally comes to mind here. In addition to their battle axes, Galloglass were known to bring bows, javelins, daggers, and “halflangs” (hand-and-a-half swords) with them. These weapons would be carried by Kern and personal attendants fighting behind their masters, very much like squires and armigiers on the European continent (Cannan, 2013, p.18-23).

As previously mentioned, I used the miniatures from Antediluvian’s range of Highlanders for my unit of Galloglass. I bought all of the packs and cherry picked the models that I liked the most. I then exchanged some of the sparths for larger pole-axes to create a fiercer impression. I also made a simple headswap on the bow carrying model using a bacinet from one of the figures I did not use. This little conversion was fairly easy and all I had to do once I had chopped off the heads was to cover the neck with some greenstuff and sculpt a simple mail collar.

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Well there ya have it you die-hards and widow makers! Please leave a comment below and tell me what you think of this unit. If there’s something I missed, or if you have tips on litterature for me to further dig into, please do tell me that as well! Until next time!

/F