"Clothing colours for Fatimid Sudanese troops" Topic

Can anyone please help with information regarding the clothing of the Sudanese spearmen and archers of the Egyptian Fatimid army?.

I remember from years ago, when all we had was the WRG books for reference, everyone seemed to have them all dressed in dark blue robes. Is this still the case? Would the clothing have been issued by the state or left to the owners whim?
Is it likely that different regiments had different coloured robes?

The reason for this is that I have the excellent Legio Heroica Fatimid army to paint, and I need to know which of the following options would be most likely:

1 – All Sudanese in one particular colour, using the colour of the belt as the unit differential.
2 – Each regiment being in a differnt colour.
3 – All troops being in different (pastel) colours, with the belt being the differential again.

Any help would be greatly appreciated

Thank you

Steve J

I waited for a while to see if someone else with, perhaps, more knowledge will answer.

As far as I know there were no uniforms for Fatimids. They could have some for their regular palace troops. After all, their neighbors Crusaders and Byzantine had them for some troops. But mostly, if the state equipped their troops, they would have uniform weapons and armor, not clothing.

A lot of troops were hired on feudal or mercenary bases. If whole tribes were hired, they could of had similar tribal clothing. It's possible that Sudanese were hired like that and had uniform tribal clothing, not state supplied. So, use your own judgement.

Hi Igor

Thanks for the reply. I will go for option 3 above, it gives the painter an almost free hand.

Steve J