"Greek Hoplites as Roman Hoplites?" Topic

Would it be too far of a stretch to use some of the recent plastic hoplite figures as early Romans?

I have a boat load of Celts, and thought it would be fun to play some of the battles that led to the sack of Rome. I am also poor, so plastic figures would be great.

What would the major difference be? Helmet styles and shield art?

Thanks for any input.

Which sack of Rome? I presume you are referring to the one in 387BC?

If you are looking at really early Romans they were very similar to the Etruscans (as an ex Etruscan city.) Etruscan hoplites looked much the same as the Greeks they were inspired by, including the shield art so you could get away with Greek hoplite figures for the richer strata of Roman citizen warriors. Perhaps some home made scuta shaped shields (from plasticard?) for the more lightly armoured figures would give a more Italian feel to the army and a few early pila wouldn't be too difficult to convert from cut down spears.

that's the one. I may be wrong, but i think the Romans were still using hoplites at the time, and didn't yet develope the manipular system.

An expert can look at period pictures of Etruscan hoplites, and of Greek hoplites, and tell you the difference.
I am not an expert.

There seems to be tiny wings on the cheek pieces, and maybe the side laminations are different, but the differences elude me.

Some, and by no means all, Etruscan used typically Italic helmets such the Etrusco – Corinthian. If you look at Avertine miniatures they have a good examples of these on their site.

Early Italian style hoplites tended to have differing styles of body armour as well as different trends in helmet decoration.
They used small breastplates, round/square/triple disc along with a metal belt as well as the tube and yoke corselet and muscle cuirass.
Their helmets were broadly similar but seemed to use more side feathers and other added decorative elements though these could also have been quite common in later Greece too.
There were some styles that did seem to be mostly Italian but if you already have greek figures then a few new obviously Etruscan/Samnite etc style figs may be enough to give the unit a more Italian feel without costing too much.

It may depend on how early are the Romans to be. VI-IV century ones could be converted from plastic early and (specially)classical hoplites, with some tweaking on the helmets to make plumes and italo-corinthians. Given the abundance of heads you could give them a try… Armour can be tricky but definitely worth the effort.

I would second the Etruscans, and maybe the Tarrantines.

I would recommend Osprey's excellent books: Early Roman Warrior, 753-321 BC and Early Roman Armies. These both give a really good explanation of how the Roman Hoplite Armies were formed at the beginning of the Republic. Also, how they fought against the Etruscans and Gauls. It's facinating to read about how the Roman upperclass could ride into battle, dismount and join in the Phalanx. Also, it seems like the upperclass Roman Hoplites would carry the round shields, but other lowerclass Hoplites would carry a variety of shields…..but, there doesn't seem to be any hard and fast rules as to how you would build your army. The variety of Greek helmets on the Immortal plastic figures and the Victrx figures are perfect for the Roman helmets.