"Theban Sacred Band" Topic

I'm interested in how others differentiate Sacred Band hoplites from other Thebans — extra shield device or armor?

You could put the Theban club on a different coloured background – I think I had plain bronze for most and white for the Sacred Band.

It was the Theban and allied cavalry who had white helmets but a bit of artistic license could be applied and give them to the SB as well.

As I recall, the Sacred Band was pairs of lovers. You could give each pair of figures a similar shield device.

Naked hoplites

I seem to recall seeing the Hercules club with a green laurel wreath somewhere. Anyone else see that?

If I remember, when they shifted to a polis-wide symbol, Thebes went to a club since Hercules was the founder. A laurel wreath for the Sacred Band seems reasonable, whether historical or not.

The Sacred Band was paired. In 2018, they were lovers, but the evidence for what they were in the 4th Century BC is not decisive. Philip of Macedon said something about "not thinking they had done anything ill" and at a range of two millennia and change it's not clear whether he meant there was nothing wrong with homosexual sex or that they had been falsely accused of the activity. Of course (a) he should have known, having been a hostage there, and (b) he'd just killed them all, anyway.

But the similar shield device has merit, though I'd go with the wreathed club myself.

Always found it interesting when attempts are made to portray a certain behavior as commonplace and accepted in the ancient world that Phillip would say -

Perish any man who suspects that these men either did or suffered anything unseemly.
— Plutarch, Pelopidas

Which still applies even if as noted above Phillip was speaking of what he considered an unfounded accusation.

Read Aristophanes' comedies. The jokes about homoeroticism are so widespread it was clearly in that grey region of semi-taboo.