Project Megálē Hellás: The Ancient Greece in Lego

Hey! This is a series of posts I plan to do here where I will show the stuff I build related to the Ancient Greece. The main goal I have is to show something I never showed before since I always show the finished result (a minifig or a group of them, a vehicle or a MOC I build or a stopmotion) but never the process it has until it's done. I want to inspire people seeing this to build their own things too and it will include some fast history lessons about what I build. Nothing special. I'm not the one to teach big things anyway. 

Photo of the Parthenon in Athens.
Source: https://www.history.com/news/ancient-greece-architecture-photos

The Ancient Greece was formed by a group of different cities-state (Polis) being the most famous ones Athens and Sparta. Sparta is my main inspiration to build. I'm not going to lie guys. My favourite moment and battle of the Ancient era is the Battle of the Thermopylae (even Roman Empire era is one of my favourite ones to study). One of my favourite battles of the whole history. What could be more epic than 300 men (plus 1000 from another Polis history forgots about) fighting against around 100.000-300.000 enemies ? 

Source: Pinterest

So far I have only done a test of minifigs trying around custom clothes over them to check how they look. Lego has a Spartan minifig from a Minifig Series already but it's yellow. They are so expensive sadly. I want mines in Flesh color (sorry Light Nougat ;-) hehe). I think it has never been done before at least I haven't seen them. If you search for Lego Spartans on Google you will find some very interesting stuff. Battle of Thermopylae for example has been done several times still I think what I will do won't be just the same as it can happen with WW2 related builds since WW2 is what most people (included me) build about.

The minifigs test I have done so far.

For the minifigs I will use the original torso LEGO used with legs that are fully light nougat color or at least in the bottom part so I can use them with the piece of red clothes over it as shown above. Due to the costs of the stuff I want my Spartans to have some parts will be fake Lego parts from AliExpress like the helmet or the sword. I hope you don't mind it guys haha. Legs torso including arms and hands plus head will be official Lego parts so the minifig is technically all original :-)

In the next updates I will show you how to create the clothes. (very easy but anyway I want to show so everyone who wants can do their own customs)

Hope you like how this idea sounds. Can't wait to see where it takes and which things I'm able to show you in the next months. I'm really excited about it.

By the way Megálē Hellás is how was called in old Greek language the cities they funded in the (nowadays) Italian part. 

To finish here you have some great epic inspiration with the cinematic videos of Assassins Creed Odyssey about the Battle of Thermopylae.

XIX century canons

 Here today I will show you how to build the 3 artillery cannons you see in the picture below. 

From left to right: M1853 "Napoleon Cannon", Napoleonic Wars
12 Pounder cannon and a smaller Napoleonic Wars 6 Pounder cannon

First we will start with the M1853 Napoleon Cannon used a lot in the USA Civil War. Here´s the parts you need to build it. 

Click on the pictures to see them bigger. All are LEGO parts but I needed to use 2 BrickArms Monopods also in order to make the build much better. 

First step

Second step. One BA monopod must hold the other one and the 1x2
modified tile must hold the first of them as shown above

Now start using the 1x1 round plates with holes. Put the first one
as the picture shows

Now we put one wheel and the other 1x1 round plate will go in the center
of the wheel fixing the wheel to the long Light Bluish Gray bar. The modified 1x1 black tile with the clip must go right above the brown modified tile with the clip. Check they fit properly (probably won't alow you to rotate going down with the modified 1x1 tile because it will crash with the brown one below)

Now we do the same with the other wheel in the other side

No we will do the tube. Both parts in the right side must be connected together and it will go in the front side of the black 1x1 modified plate. The ones in the left side goes the Technic one inside the round brick and them together fit in the back part of the mentioned modified plate. Results in the next picture

Now in the empty stud we must add this black part to hold a long bar that will represent the sticks used to clean the barrel of the gun and push the powder to the rear (or even better if it's another Black or Reddish Brown 1x1 modified tile with clip)

Must look like this

Finished !

Now the next cannon. The little 6 Pounder gun. A fast and easy build.

Parts needed

3L bar must join the Technic parts in the thickest part as shown 2 pictures down

Now the same in the opposite side. The space left in the middle (of both sides) must
 allow the clip of an 1x1 modified tile to fit in the middle of the Technic parts

Now the same in the bottom part

Must look like that

Now we build the barrel as we did in the previous cannon

Now this little parts in the longest bar to separate the wheel from the tube

Now we put the wheels in their place...

... and the black 1x1 round parts at the end of each side of the bar
 to avoid the falling of the wheels

Finished !

The last one will be my favourite. The 12 Pounder cannon. 

The parts you need

This is a cut tube around 2 cm long

The tube must go inside the side holes and the 1x1 plate under the
 1x1 modified brick as shown above

The same we did in the previous cannon

We add this Technic part to hold the barrel later. Doing it that way
we will leave empty the center space to make a bucket hang

Now we add a 1cm long tube with a 1x1 modified tile with the
clip in the tube as you can see in the picture

Now we do the barrel. The same we did in both previous cannons

Step done

Now the rest of the barrel

Now we will add the wheels. First the black round plate as
you see in the picture below

Now we put the wheel...

... and the round plate with the hole in the end of the bar as always

Step done

The same in the other side

Now we put the BrickArms U-Clip we need in the handle
 of the bucket

And we put in right under the barrel in the bar

And finally another modified plate with the clip looking up

Finished ! Vive l'empereur !

Finally guys let's clarify something. All the cannons have the same width of the barrel so you can use this trick below.

Using this ice cream part you can put it inside the barrel and act as if it is smoke of the BrickArms Cannonball shown below because it fits perfect! No lie. Fits that perfect that now I can't take it out so take care haha 

Enjoy your new artillery guys :-)