Help needed for portuguese prazeros army

[Siaba]

I'm contemplating building a portuguese prazeros (or prazeiros) army for HEART OF AFRICA but can't find information on the appearance of some troops.
Does anyone know how Makua or Humbi tribesmen looked like ?
I haven't found picture of portuguese settlers and slave soldiers of the period. I have a few ideas of figures to use to represent them but pictures would be most welcome 
Thank you for your help 

[Plynkes]

You've picked a pretty obscure army to go for there. Info is pretty thin on the ground in a language I understand. The Humbi are from Angola and the Makua from Moçambique so you wouldn't want both in the same army (but of course you might like to have both so you could field Prazeiros from either colony). 

Just about the only thing I know about the Makua is that for some reason the women like to paint their faces white...


Sorry, that isn't much help, is it. 

One thing seems clear is that Nguni fashions seem to dominate Mozambique. Most pictures of tribesmen from there show them with Zulu-type shields. I don't have any details of Makua fashions but a best guess would be to make him a spearman with a Zulu-type shield (perhaps Foundry Darkest Africa generic spearmen and get some Zulu shields for them). Might be wrong, but it's better than nothing, I guess.

I have a drawing in a book of a native Auxiliare from Mozambique, and he has a spear, a small Zulu-type shield, a cloth skirt with a check pattern (rather than a loin-cloth),  a sort of cloak/cape and a single feather in his hair. Unfortunately the book doesn't say what tribe he belongs to, but you could perhaps use him as a model for your Makua, if you don't mind taking a chance that he is wrong. He's right for the region, if not that particular tribe (the army list does after all say "Makua, Humbi or similar").

A similar picture of an Angolan Auxiliare has a guy in a loin cloth (though a big one that hangs down as low as his knees), with a throwing spear with feathered fletching on it (like the Ngoni ones) and what looks like a sort of feather pom-pom headdress (a bit like the Matabele ones). He has no shield. Again, I don't know what tribe he is, just a "typical" Angolan tribesman. But maybe you could base your Humbi on him with the understanding that they might not have actually looked like that.

Hope that helps a bit.

[Plynkes]

From what little I have read about the Prazeros, they seem more like local warlords than "settlers", a good mix of native and Portuguese stock that developed independently of any Colonial administration, carving out their own little kingdoms. The famous ones who fought the Portuguese seem to have been of mixed descent. That might affect how you want to portray them. Perhaps find Africans in European clothes and paint their skins quite light, or get some Europeans and paint them quite dark (!).

As for the achikunda slave-soldiers, sadly again I don't have an image or even a description of them. It seems that by the second half of the 19th Century they had evolved into mercenary bands rather than being slaves, under war leaders called amukazambo (sounds like a stage magician's magic word). What I do have is a picture in a book of gun-armed Barue tribesmen, and it seems the Prazeros and achikunda were in with the Barue, so maybe it isn't too much of a leap to base the look of the chikunda on them. Apart from the fact that the ones in my picture are bare-headed, they look pretty much like the Wangwana of Tanganyika (gun-armed and dressed in varying amounts of cloth wrapped into skirts and such), so you could use these sort of figures for them:



Perhaps with a sprinkling of these:


With perhaps a Ruga-Ruga or a native musketeer in European dress as their officer (seems reasonable that he might dress a little more ostentatiously than his men).

These figures might come in handy for a Prazero army too in various roles, as they have a suitable mix of Europe and Africa about their dress:


Sorry it's a bit vague, but it's just about all I've got. It's all rather speculative so feel free to ignore it. You seem to like a challenge, so are you going to do a Portuguese Colonial expedition to fight them too? 

[Siaba]

Yes 
I intend to use Mutiny British in coat and covered shako for the early period and union soldiers in sack coat and hat for the late period. I still have to check my uniforms plates to see if water canteen and haversack are OK or need some modifications.

Thank you very much for your enlightened advice, Plynkes 
I'll use Darkest Africa spearmen with zulu-like shiel for Makua. I'm not sure that Makua men use kaolin to paint their face white but it would be nice to have some warriors painted that way in an army.
As for the rest, I thought that Copplestone "Amazon explorer" or "Big game hunter" would be OK with a tanned skin tone to represent prazeiros leaders.
Cacadores can be represented by FOUNDRY askaris. Some of them with a kepi.
I really like your idea of mixing askaris and askaris in european clothes for prazeiros troops.

Livingstone described the chikunda as wearing excentric dress, so FOUNDRY askari with a mix of Ruga-ruga should do the trick.

Thank you again, Plynkes 

[carlos marighela]

If you read Portuguese then there is an excellent series of Osprey format books produced in Portugal called Batalhas de Portugal. I don't have the one in question but they do have a title on the later campaigns in Moçambique, which may be of assistance:

MOÇAMBIQUE, 1895.
A Campanha de Todos os Heróis
de António José Telo

Try here: http://www.arqnet.pt/portal/agenda/col_batalhas.html

[meninobesta]

Didn't know about those books, thanks Carlos!

Probably my father already has a couple of them stashed somewhere... I'll have to investigate!

If someone needs some portuguese to english translation just ask!

[Plynkes]

Those books do look very interesting, the Moçambique one particularly (ooh, there's 1918 Western Front one and all). Do they have nice colour plates like Ospreys, Carlos?  (shallow of me, I know, but I like pretty pictures)

[meninobesta]

(ooh, there's 1918 Western Front one and all)

speaking about that, there is going to be a exposition about the CEP (Portuguese expeditionary Corps) here in Lisbon. unfortunatelly the weather is really bad and I can't go there during this weekend, but hopefully will go there during march and post some pictures over here

http://www.museu.presidencia.pt/expo_temporarias_detail.php?ID=1964

[Siaba]

Thank you, Carlos 
I don't speak portuguese but I could understand the texts on the website. So, I'll try to buy the book.

[carlos marighela]

Osprey sized and yes some colour plates, varies a bit between titles I believe.

I really wanted the one on the Indian Invasion of Goa, kicking myself for not buying it before, as it's now out of print.

For further information about this you might try contacting my friend Nuno Pereira, who has a blog about Portuguese Colonial Warfare: O Soldado Pratico/ The Practical Soldier. The blog's focus is on the 16th and 17thC but Nuno has a broad interest in Portuguese military matters from the 15th C through to the de-colonisation wars in the '60s and '70s. Nuno pops up on various wargaming forums, usually posts as 'kingscarbine'. I know he commissioned some Portuguese figures from Eureka for the late 19th/ early 20th C.

[Siaba]

Could it be possible to have a link to the blog, please ?
I'm also interested in others portuguese colonial wars 

[carlos marighela]

Here's Nuno's blog on Portuguese colonial warfare in Africa (sorry I'd forgotten about that one):

http://kingscarbine.blogspot.com/

For some reason I can't find his O Soldado Pratico blog but he runs a Yahoo group, the Practical Soldier that deals with earlier exploits. Pretty good if you are interested in renaissance exploits in Ormuz etc.

http://games.groups.yahoo.com/group/PracticalSoldier/

There's also another Yahoo group that deals specifically with Portuguese military history. It's in Portuguese but I think at least one or two of the posters speak English fairly fluently.

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/portugalmilitar/

[Plynkes]

Hey Siaba, this Humbi fellow on the blog Carlos linked to...



...the picture I was describing of an Angolan tribesman in my book is a drawing of this photo. Turns out he was Humbi after all! 

[Siaba]

Very good!
Thank you for the links and the picture 

[Hywel Dda]

I'm not sure that Makua men use kaolin to paint their face white but it would be nice to have some warriors painted that way in an army.

Having lived in Mocambique up in Makua areas (Cabo Delgado and Gaza provinces)  face painting is something solely done by women is my understanding - used to soften the skin (maybe protect it also) - using it for men would be akin to portraying RM Commandos in rouge and lipstick on the basis that thats how their girlfriends appear! There are of course places in Africa where men do apply face paint in different contexts but not Makuas