"Old Glory Arabs as Moors?" Topic

I'm putting together a Portuguese army for early 12th century and wanted to add some units for them to use as allies or fight against. This is a period that I am light on information about and am not sure of the differences between the Arabs from the various manufacturers crusades lines and the Moors available. Will they both work? I think the Berbers might be different, but not sure about them either.

Thanks for any info

Berbers were an Atlantic people who came under Arab influence and adopted Islam. Donnington have a good range in 15mm have a look at the various figures at this link for what I think is a good Berber look. Ignore the skin tones though Berbers were white.

link

link

I'm thinking of doing a Berber army in 15mm.

The Arab invasion of Iberia was mostly done with Berber troops on behalf of thy Syrian Arabs of the Umayyad Caliphate. By the 12th century, Islamic Iberia had broken into city states in the south. Some of these were more Arab and some more Berber. The two groups fought each other. Yes, generic Arabs work for Iberians.

I think the Berbers wore the face veil? If so, the Gripping Beast plastic Arabs infantry sets have heads for those.

Some illustrations from the period:
Murabit? cavalry in the Psalter of San Millan de la Cogolla, 11th century AD, Mozarab, Bib. da la Academia de la Historia, Madrid
Saracens (Moors) in 'The Arrest of Saint Aventinus', St Aventin Church, France, 12th century
Soldiers in the Rylands Beatus – Commentary on the Apocalypse by Beatus of Liébana, Castile (Burgos?), copy of c.1175

Druzhina
Spanish and North African Illustrations of Costume & Soldiers

The Almoravid Berbers all wore the face veil. They though the mouth was unclean. They were replaced by the Almohad Berbers by the mid 12th Century. The Almohads thought that men always wearing a veil was girly and decadent. Still, you're going to cover face because of the dust when your riding in a dusty landscape.

Thanks all, sounds like I can just wing it (other than the Berbers which I will use figures that have covered faces for them).

This is in 28mm by the way, sorry that I forgot to mention that.

OB – The Berbers are a Hamitic people related to the inhabitants of the Horn of Africa, from where their ancestors are believed to have originally migrated, and so their original skin tone was brown. Many Roman visitors to the region describe them thus, even going so far as to call them almost black. Modern Berbers evince a range of skin tones, from white to dark brown, due to ethnic mixing. Any whiteness is largely attributable to the major influence of European slaves, of whom more were present in North Africa from antiquity up to the 17th century than black slaves in the Americas during the height of the African slave trade.

I was faffing around a bit with this when I was thinking about how to represent the Moors battleboard for Saga.

Keep in mind that ol' Tariq turned up in 711 and various successive states of differing size and centralisation followed on until 1492. Much of that 781 years time being spent with multiple Christian and Muslim states in Iberia, clobbering or getting along with each other here and there.

700 years is a LONG time for languages to develop, and people to change how they look, sound, and smell. So in light of that, you have a specific image in mind you want to depict, or you're inspired by particular illustrations or archaeological finds (and I'm always impressed with Druzhina's posts in this regard), winging it is very much the order of the day.

I've only ever had one undergraduate history class many moons ago ago on the history of the fringes of the Arab conquests so if someone has better sources I'm all eyes, but I decided to do some chopping and kitbashing with Gripping Beast plastic Arabs, Conquest Normans, and and GBP Dark Age Warriors to get the look I wanted. A while ago someone on TMP had a link to their own more involved conversions where they sculpted on particular design traits over the Conquest Normans, IIRC, and they looked the part.

Regarding skin tones – I haven't been to North Africa or the south of Iberia, but if the people I've met from the Maghreb are anything to go by, they run as wide a range as modern India or Israel, say.

Saga's Moorish faction DOES have a 'special unit' called the Black Guard which I decided to depict in line with the portrayal of Ibn Tashfin (or his movie name Ben Yusuf) in 1961's El Cid So my Black Guard are dressed in very dark blue, all veiled, with minimal shield design and no real frippery on their clothes, whereas my plan for the rest of my figs is to have some bright geometric patterns, loud robe colours, and mostly bare heads. I don't know how accurate it'll all be, but it all fits the feel of the thing, with long-settled Iberians sitting around in gardens composing poetry and a bunch of unpleasant hardy fellows come across the straits to inflame their religious sentiments.

Henry I'd say the whole Hamitic thing is so mired in confusion and so useful as a political football as to render it useless. The linguistic ideas underpinning it have collapsed and the supposed shared physiognomy likewise.

There does seem to be much use throughout the long debate of the terms Caucasian and Caucasoid where the Berbers are concerned and a recognition that the Berbers are an indigenous people. Lazily I used the term white but if you are painting figures that's what you need to know.