Hell of the Hospitaller

Charge of the Knights Hospitaller.

The Knights Hospitaller, also known as the Order of Hospitallers or simply Hospitallers, and known at various points in their history as the Order of St John, Knights of Rhodes and Knights of Malta, were a major Western Christian military order that originated during the Middle Ages (Wikipedia).

I have never really tried to paint fully armoured European knights so here is my first attempt. All I knew was that I wanted to depict a mass combat scene with charging knights in it and keep it grounded in history rather than a fantasy. After I looked into various medieval knight orders the Hospitallers caught my eye over the Templers, the Teutonic Knighs and others.

To maintain a historical grounding I referenced knights from pictures by and . I also used chain mail brush.

Done mostly in ArtRage 3 Pro with editing in Photoshop CS2.

Comment most welcome.