What a lot of details!
Real mules.
Great set.

There is a mixture of 4 auxiliaries and the rest legionaries. The auxiliaries have spears and oval shield. The presence of both types in the set is wellcome, although unexpected.

Well, it's not that easy to distinguish between legionaries and auxiliaries. E.g., some legionaries had oval shields as shown on the late 1st c AD gravestone of Caius Castricius of Legio II Adiutrix. And part of the legionaries apparently had always been equipped not with pila, but with lances, and accordingly were called "lanciarii" (mentioned by Arrian and others). Which means: a set with more options than expected at first sight. Great!

Dear Pol, you are right. But there are a few things I have trouble understanding. First - Arrian, died 175 AD. From his writings, his account of Alexander's wars are of the utmost importance. He had vast military experience, and wrote several works, that have only partly survived. I could not find any evidence of lanciarii during his lifetime. The lanciarii, together with other legionaries - solenses, martenses, ioviani and herculiani (elite legions) were formed late, under Diocletian, and existed in the 4th century AD. The appearance of the legionaries to that date was very different from the Strelets set. Futhermore, I am not sure that the shield on the mentioned gravestone is oval and flat, as the auxiliary shield was. It could be the variation from c 10 BC to after 100 AD, the republican shield shorn off at top and bottom. However, the legionaries in the Strelets set have the shield used from c AD 40 to after 200 AD. The oval shield returned c 150 AD and survived to the end of the Empire. Praetorians had the republican shield, quite different from the flat oval shield. Marines might have kept longer the oval shield. Another interesting possibility, would be for Caius Castricius to have been a mounted messenger, drawn from the ranks of the legion, and provided with a cavalry shield. All legionaries were trained in swimming and riding, and 120/legion were dispatch riders.
However, for this set, I see the only use the one mentioned before: early imperial legionaries and 4 poses of auxiliares.

Regards,
Radu

Romans. Great!

Now a decent set of 1st-2nd centuries AD Roman Imperial auxiliary cavalry, in full battle and parade order, mounted on splendidly attired standing or walking horses, would be the highest of feelings!!!

What do you think, Strelets?

(Alas, Alanger quite clearly is not the company you can rely on. They didn't release the promised Roman Imperial infantry set, not to speak of the Roman Imperial auxiliary cavalry set they had also promised. A lousy company!!!)

I've got my fingers crossed for colors of either Terracotta Red, Mid-Blue, or Silver.

Excellent details. They will look good walking into my Zvezda Roman Wooden Stockade!

I'm hoping for silver or grey. Terracotta Red would be nice for opposing Persians, to match the exisiting sets made by Zvezda.

The wrong color can be quite a turn-off, even with otherwise nice figures, e.g. Orion's German paratroopers in red instead of grey or blue.

Shame on me and I am very happy that I am wrong. Romans - Great reinforcements for my diorama!!

Many thanks Strelets for this great stuff. The colour of the plastic does not matter to me as I want to paint these guys

I am looking forward to hear what exactly period you want to make and what enemies we can await.

As for Legionaries or Auxiliaries I am sorry not to aggree with you Pol. We have this lanceris but the oval shield was worn by the Auxiliaries. Maybe we have some exceptions, but then we should have the lorica segmentata and no chainmail on the figures. For me they are looking like Auxiliaries. Maybe you can give us more information to show me that I am wrong?

I am better in 18th and 19th century uniforms, so I would be happy to learn more about Ancients.

cheers
Uwe

As you may have noticed I explicitly mentioned a tombstone which corroborates what I said. Here it is:

http://www.romanarmy.com/cms/component/option,com_imagebase/task,view/cid,65/Itemid,94/

Check out the details. You'll find that this man is an ordinary miles, i.e. a legionary. He is equipped with two different pila but also has an oval shield, and apparently a flat one. Further, his armour is chain mail. Actually, there are a lot of sources which prove that many legionaries wore chain mail rather than the lorica segmentata (for instance, you could try and check out the pictorial sources referred to by the same website). As for the oval shield this may or may not have been an exception as Legio II Adiutrix was made up of former sailors, i.e. auxiliaries, and may have continued to use the flat oval shield associated with auxiliaries even after the creation of the legion (for some time, at least). But still, this is a legionary, and he's carrying his oval shield while being a legionary, not an auxiliary.

Hi Pol,

thank you for this link. The Creation of this unit from Sailors is a good explanation why he looks different to the usual Legionary.

So I aggree with you about this unit. Why shouldn't the Romans being different to all other armies through history who wore the old items out before they received the new ones.

Many thanks for this interesting information!!

cheers
Uwe