The League of Augsburg

Byzantium has even in its rich sounding name, a sense of mystery about it. Anyone who has read anything about Byzantium or the Byzantines themselves cannot fail to be impressed and at the same time disturbed by their history and customs.

Looking towards the European shore. Janissaries prepare to attack

The name has disappeared from maps and replaced by Istanbul but the Turks seem proud of its pre...

Hunnic organization and warriors - magnificent illustration

I could almost believe the curator team at the Army Museum are wargamers. Why? because they have created exhibits which inspire and inform we detail obsessed gamers who lap up every little piece of information about our chosen armies.

Turkic tactics of envelopment

The tactical display boards provided to describe Hunnic and Turkic warfare are...

Attila.... The Turk. A bust in the museum

Returning to Istanbul and my visit to the Military Museum there, the second post in this series focuses on the early Turkish peoples and their warfare from the saddle.

A Turkish tribe at camp in Central Asia pre 6th century

Whereas we in the West particularly when playing wargames, have the habit of splitting up steppe peoples into periods and variously...

The Blue Mosque.. not military but wonderfully impressive

I have a very privileged working life. I get to travel all over the world and whilst doing that occasionally manage a day off here and there if the location holds some interest for me in a military context.

That's what I CALL a gun! Ottoman cannon of the 15th century

I couple of years back I made it to Istanbul for a job and was fortunate...

She would not have looked like this for long!

Mrs H had in fact beat me to the punch. She'd visited the Vasa Museum in 2013 whilst carousing around the Baltic on a cruise ship. She insisted it was a 'must see' so we walked there on a beautiful Spring morning which everyone in Stockholm told us was quite unseasonable!

depiction of the Vasa going down

Another view of the lovely model

Admission was not...

Cavalry buff coat and front plate cuirass 1660-70s

This blog post is fairly self explanatory. I am going to limit the text and you can look at the pictures.

saddle and pistol holsters

1690s period collarless coat, French copied pocket pattern

I took so many pictures during the various museum visits that inclusion would have made this post unacceptably long. If members are interested in other pictures...

Inevitably I had to navigate through other halls to get out of the Museum. I found the late 18th century and 19th century halls full of beautiful exhibits too.

Here are some examples:

Enemies of Napoleon

The wonderful vignette of Swedish Napoleonic artillery running back a gun in the 1813 campaign is really an impressive exhibit.

different angle on the gun.

The 'Old Enemy' features in the Napoleonic...

Swedish Army Museum

Karl XII statue near Parliament

I visited the Army Museum five years ago as a small celebration after being successful in a job interview. That visit was a great experience but I unfortunately lost the photographs I took.

Exhibits don't get much better than this close in shot - the shock of the charge! As if I needed any more inspiration!

Having arrange to meet two of the blog and...

Strandvagen - The Army museum is over behind this avenue

Barry Hilton - Occasionally, my travels allow me to visit exciting places which are very appealing from a hobby perspective. I combined a recent business trip to Stockholm with some time off and managed to squeeze in some fairly heavyweight hobby action which I thought blog followers may find quite interesting.

Royal Palace on the right

Part 1...

Somewhere in the trenches.....

Colin Napier continues with tales of Protestant Frenchmen fighting their King......