I'm happy to combine postage for multiple orders.

Contents: 12 figures & 12 horses Poses: 6 poses & 4 horse poses Material: Plastic Colour: Grey

Cement assembly, paint required (cement and paint not included)

With current events in the Middle East the Crusades have been more in the spotlight in recent years, yet until this set was released we had to make do with the Italeri mixed infantry/cavalry set.

Unlike the Italeri set, which dated itself (badly), we have no clues as to date on this box, so we will address that first. All the men wear full mail with long sleeves and mittens (although curiously the sculptor has suggested separate fingers for these). They wear round or conical helmets, including several face masks, and most have sleeveless surcoats. They carry shields of mostly 'heater' design or slightly earlier (when still developing from the kite style). Finally several of the horses have a full caparison and fairly low saddles. Surcoats appeared by the mid 12th century (at least in the Holy Land), and caparisons are also thought to have been more common by the later part of that century. The full mail hauberk with mittens suggests a date after c.1170, which was also the era when the heater shield was evolving. By c.1220 such knights would increasingly have worn the great helm that covered the head, and none of these figures have any plate armour at all, so we would suggest these figures date to the later 12th and early 13th centuries. As such they would cover both the third and fourth crusades comfortably, the third being arguably the most famous of the crusades, and the one involving Saladin, so this set would match Caesar's Saladin set.

The craftsmanship on display here is of the usual high Caesar standard, with excellent detail and virtually no flash.

This abridged appraisal is supplied care of Plastic Soldier Review.