Today we're showing three pieces of artwork from our October 2025 series books! Let us know in the comments which books you'd like to see featured in our November 2025 Artwork Reveal!

 

Armies of Justinian the Great, AD 527–65

By Raffaele D’Amato

Illustrated by Catalin Draghici and Giorgio Albertini

 

Art of three soldiers from Justinian the Great's army

THE INFANTRY
RIGHT: Stratiôtes, Numerus Quintani (ex-Legio V Macedonica), ad 540
LEFT: Drakonarios of Daci, ad 534
TOP: Isaurian elite warrior; battle of Thannuris, ad 527

Artwork requested by Daniel Figueroa Giraldez.

 

Bouvines 1214: Philippe Augustus and the Battle for France

By James Titterton

Illustrated by Graham Turner

 

Art showing the Battle of Bouvines 1214

RENAUD DE DAMMARTIN SALLIES OUT FROM BEHIND HIS BRABANÇONS, 27 JULY 1214

Renaud, Count of Boulogne, forms the rearguard of the coalition army with a company of Brabançons. These tough, professional foot soldiers have formed a ring, ‘like a castle’, protected from the enemy knights by their long spears. They are well protected with mail coats or padded cloth jackets (gambesons) and steel helmets, making an almost-impenetrable obstacle to the French, who lack the missile weapons to harass them from afar. There is a narrow gap in the ring, which Renaud has been using to ride in and out of the formation. He leads his remaining knights on forays to attack the French, retreating behind his foot soldiers to rest or to escape when heavily pressed. Guillaume le Breton noted the unusual crest he wore on his helm: two ‘horns’ made of baleen, ‘waving in the breeze, taken from the black ribs which the whale dwelling in the sea of Brittany bears in its cavernous gills’. Such crests were unusual in the early 13th century but would become more common in the following centuries, particularly in the theatrical world of the tournament. Renaud is followed by one of his household knights, bearing a banner decorated with the Dammartin arms: silver and blue stripes surrounded by a red border (barry of argent and azure, a bordure gules). According to Guillaume le Breton, Renaud had sworn to Hugues de Boves, who had accused him of treachery, that he would ‘either die fighting or be captured’ that day.

Artwork requested by Paul Williams.

 

Central Pacific 1943–45: Seventh Air Force's island-hopping war

By Brian Lane Herder

Illustrated by Gareth Hector

Art showing a plane attacking a train

P-47N Thunderbolts strafe a train at Tosu, July 6, 1945

It is the summer of 1945, 413th Fighter Group P-47N Thunderbolt fighter-bombers stationed at American-occupied Ie Shima are on a search and destroy mission over Kyushu in the Japanese Home Islands. A section of 413th Fighter Group P-47Ns is seen here strafing a Japanese troop train on Kyushu with rockets and .50cal. machine guns. The Japanese locomotive, a Mitsubishi D51, is leaking steam from several ruptures in its boiler and is either in the process of exploding or will explode very soon from the heavy damage it is taking from the American fighters.

The 413th Fighter Group flew with a distinctive yellow empennage. After arriving in Saipan in late spring 1945, the 413th Group flew several practice strafing missions against Truk in May before deploying to Ie Shima in June. Upon arriving in Ie Shima, the 413th Group immediately began conducting strikes and sweeps of a variety of targets across China and Japan, including factories, radar stations, airfields, small ships, and railyards.

German trains of any importance typically mounted specialized railroad cars of twin or quadruple medium-caliber anti-aircraft guns that fired back at Allied strafers. However, this set-up was apparently less common from the Japanese; in contrast to several flak wagons, this Japanese train only has a single flat car with a pair of 25mm cannon firing back at the P-47Ns.

The 413th had originally been scheduled to be transferred from the Seventh Air Force to the re-deploying Eighth Air Force, where it would help escort the Eighth Air Force’s B-29s to Japan. As it happened, by August the Eighth Air Force was not yet operational and the wartime transfer never happened. The 413th Fighter Group P-47Ns flew a single B-29 escort mission on August 8, 1945, escorting XXI Bomber Command B-29s against Yawata. In its only VLR escort mission, the 413th Group scored five confirmed kills and two probables.