Menu
| |
15mm Jurchen Jin Dynasty, 1115-1234AD
|
The Jurchen Jin Dynasty have been made as the virtually eternal foes of our popular 15mm Sung Chinese range. The Jin dynasty was founded in 1115AD, when, with the help of the Sung Chinese, these Manchurian horse warriors rebelled against their Khitan Liao masters and established their own empire. They soon fell out with their erstwhile Sung Chinese allies, and campaigns for control of Sung territory they had occupied during the revolt began in 1125AD and went on, with varying intensity and constant changes of fortune, for over a century. The Jin Dynasty was ultimately overthrown, after a long and hard fight, by the Mongols in 1234.
Jurchen cavalry was very good and was described as fighting in mixed formations with heavily protected lancers in the front rank, backed by lighter armed and armoured horse archers -- some of these were unarmoured, others in the middle ranks presumably lightly-armoured. For infantry they employed northern Chinese and other peoples in light formations. There is also mention of a very heavily armoured elite called the Iron Pagoda, which are often interpreted as cataphract style cavalry. Some game systems allow these to be infantry, and if you choose to follow that interpretation, you may wish to use the Polearm infantry from our Sung Chinese range. (There was a great deal of overlap between the dress and equipment of the Chinese and the Jurchen in this period.)
Please note that some of the mounted archer figures are one piece castings, with the rider and the horse cast together (the ones shooting forward).
Models shown on this page were painted by Peter Kershaw.
|
|
