Polish Dismounted Dragoons, Pancerni and the Husaria

 Finally! the last boxes containing units of the 17th C Polish force.

The Dragoons, dismounted. 

Sun must've been goin' down.

Same problem w/unit#2.

The Pancerni 

 Pancerni means armored rider. Armed with bows, pistols, swords, lances, muskets, these brave fellows rode in units of their own, or rear ranks of Hussar units.

Bow armed.

The officer figure radiates attitude.

Yet another unit, mixed armament.

Blue, white, red coats all richly lined.

The Husaria

The archetypes of the army in Poland.  First are the Lithuanian Hussars.  All the Husaria figures are Old Glory.

Slightly different armor in these units.

Only one unit of these.

From the Husaria box.

War axes, swords, pistols,lances, spitballs (ok, maybe not the last) all encased in a almost 3/4 length segmented armor.  Top that off with the intimidating wings, lots of training on horseback, yeah a lot to like with these fellows.

The tactical unit, called a huf, was between 70 to 150 or so .

There was traditionally the 'black huf' which lead the charge. This huf was usually the strongest huf, up to twice normal size.

Sometimes a kettle drummer provided 'music' for a unit.

At home in their box.

Interestly, the husaria units usually contained rear ranks made up of pancerni. Maybe when I play the army next, I'll try that out to see what happens.

Rules I use to play the era are the Piquet variant for the 16th Century,  Anchor of Faith.  The ability to recreate different ratings with various strengths and weaknesses  beyond arms & armor type is very useful in games pitting Poles against Ottomans, Cossack & Swedish armies. 

An example of a game against the Swedes can be found  on an old post: 

set up

https://pancerni-fishtales.blogspot.com/2012/10/a-little-game-using-swedes-and-poles.html

gameplay

https://pancerni-fishtales.blogspot.com/2012/10/poles-vs-swedes-october-2012-game.html

 

That pretty much sums up the tour of the 17th century Poles in my collection.  As evidenced  in the photos, there is some tlc to be applied to lances broken or fallen off, some riders to re-glue. Still, an army I have and will get out to play again.