Medieval Islamic Cavalry
These represent the Seljuk and Syrian heavy cavalry of the 12th to 13th Centuries. There's a mix of armour styles of mail and lamellar and varying helmets from all enclosing mail hoods with elaborate spiked helmets to open faced helmets with turbans.
The bow cases and arrow quivers are optional as Arab heavy cavalry did not use the bow but Seljuk Askaris did. There are a few bow firing arms included as well as swords, spears, lances, axes and maces.
Seljuk Turks formed a large proportion of any Amir’s household troops in Syria and Egypt so we included some Seljuk heads with their distinctive hair in three braids, two to the side of the head and one down the back. We have included the Seljuk fur cap called the Sharbush worn by Chieftains and apparently Saladin wore one over the top of his helmet or mail hood.
Swords are a mix of the straight bladed type but also the curved sabre and there will be plenty of shield options.
For further flexibility you are able to combine a lot of the heads, shields and weapons from this set with the very versatile Norman cavalry set to create some more varieties of Arab cavalry. Islamic armies made great use of captured Crusader armour, weapons and shields so there is no reason a Norman cavalry figure with the addition of a turbaned head, Islamic shield and weapon arm could not ride along in your Fatamid Egyptian cavalry units.
