"My AoW Dark Age A-Frames" Topic

Hello! I painted up a pair of Architects of War dark ages buildings and thought I'd share. They painted up easily, and even with my mediocre skills I think they turned out nicely.

Progress photos and thoughts on my blog. Also, I'm not well versed on ancient architecture. What sort of timeframe and geographic location could these buildings be used for? Could they be used for celtic or ancient germans? What about later than the typical dark ages into early medieval?

Boy, hardly mediocre! That fireplace effect is fantastic!

Very nice! Love the interiors!

Those are very well done.

Looks great. I got a couple other kits from Architects of War and loved them. Really like their animals to go with them as well. Makes it seems more realistic.

Thanks all! Agreed Amanda, I painted up a few of their pigs. Looking forward to adding more livestock to bring a little life to the village.

Lookin' good! As to time and location for the houses, I'd say you'd be good for most anywhere in Northern Europe from the Iron Age to the 12th century. Not Celtic Britain, because the roundhouse was the preferred type, but later, the Saxons built that sort of house in Britain. I found this webpage when researching houses for my Gaulish warband. link It has a great overview of house types.

From wiki:

A Grubenhaus (pl. Grubenhäuser compounded from the German Grube [pit or cavity] and Haus [house]) is a type of sunken floored building built in many parts of northern Europe between the 5th and 12th centuries AD.

Some archaeologists -- "Calling Dr, Jones!" -- suggest that in western Europe at least the small size of many, their proximity to other buildings, and the finding of loom weights, all point to specialized use. I'd suggest better dating of the finds!! Common sense suggests that PERHAPS increased affluence late in the period when these Grubenhäuser were still used permitted a) building better "homes," and this allowed b) older structures to be repaired and re-used for domestic purposes?

The value of the originals early-on as "homes" is obvious. Built low-to-the-ground (indeed, over pits), with next to no walls, meant great energy savings keeping them warm. In addition, digging a pit and no walls saves immensely on time, building materials, and SKILL! Keep 'em SMALL early-on to save more of all those precious resources.

As time wore ON, then one can easily see the the structural progression… Raise the roof, insert walls, gradually raise the floor to ground level (a lot of archaeologists argue that the original pits DID or DID NOT have wooden floors to keep some kind of storage underneath, or keep damp from the ground out), but, dig the pit a bit deeper and put in a ground floor? BASEMENT!! At the same time, build the huts "bigger" --- we're not talking the war-band chief or warlord's long house or hall here…