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Centaurs are half human and half horse - you can judge which half is which from our photos. Inevitably there are conflicting descriptions of their attributes, even in the original Greek mythology, and some sources have them as little more than wild animals, but those in this set are clearly very much more intelligent and civilised than that. All are wearing something, sometimes a full cuirass and helmet, sometimes no more than a belt. All are naked below the waist - apparently, unlike humans, centaurs are not bothered about covering any of that region. So clearly they are smart enough to mimic or choose a similar appearance to their Greek neighbours, while the rest are wearing no more than a belt or other strap from which a bow case or sword is held. The archer wears a belt round the (lower) belly, so if you think about it he must get someone else to tie that on since his arms are nowhere near long enough to be able to do it himself. Some of the weapons are quite Greek like the Kopis swords, but Greeks did not go into battle with axes like this, nor large hammers, so clearly centaurs also have their own preferences. Every centaur seems to be in a very active pose, mostly moving forward at speed, and clearly in a fight, so are nice and lively. Not all the poses work well for real horses, but who is to say that centaurs had exactly the same physique as horses?

As every figure is a single piece, there are some extra restrictions on what poses are possible, but we thought the sculptor has done well with these. We tend to associate centaurs with archery, so perhaps there could have been more archers here, but again, who is to say that this is a problem? The detail is good, as is the musculature on both upper and lower body, but there are a few areas of flash despite a generally very clean mould seam. Our favourite pose here was the creature with the javelins, and our least-favourite was the one with a sword in each hand, but all of them are pretty decent, and make up by far the most unusual mounted set we have yet seen (if you can describe them as 'mounted', which you probably cannot).