Sir Humphrey Littlebury of Holbeach Hurn died around 1380, and very nearly everything that can be said about him can be said because he is still there. He lies in All Saints, Holbeach, in the Lincolnshire fens — originally at the east end of the north aisle, in what was then the Littlebury Chapel, and now moved to the north-west corner. His family helped pay for that church, which went up largely between 1340 and 1380, and the tomb chest beneath him carries the same Decorated Gothic work, a run of elaborate ogee-arched niches. The effigy shows him in full plate and mail with sword, sword belt and shield. His feet rest on a lion. His head rests on his great helm, and the crest on it is a woman's face. Monuments like this are not merely ornament — carved effigies are among the best evidence we have for what harness actually looked like at a given moment, cut by craftsmen who could see the real thing, and Littlebury's belongs to exactly the decades when English knights were completing the long changeover from mail to plate.

Tradition of London give him that transitional harness: plate at the arms and legs, a rounded bascinet with the mail aventail hanging to the shoulders, a plain yellow jupon over the body, sword drawn, and a white shield charged with two red lions. He is a foot figure at 54mm and pairs well with the range's other standing knights — Sir Richard Pembridge and Thomas de Beauchamp from the same English century, or King of Poland for something from the far side of Europe. Foot figures build a different kind of diorama than mounted ones do: a church interior, a hall, a group in conversation before the horses are brought — the moments a knight actually spent most of his life in.

Model: k14 / Tradition of London / 54mm (1/32) scale / 1 piece set

All hand painted Toy Soldier sets packed in the Classic Tradition Red Boxes. All Toy Soldiers cast in quality white metal, and individually hand painted in gloss enamels.

Please allow 2-3 weeks delivery.