Tuesday 9 August 2022

An early Swedish wargaming book (How To Wage War With Toy Soldiers)


Just came across this on the Tradition Facebook page a Swedish book published in 1914 (?) about playing with toy soldiers, sadly in Swedish (which I don't read or speak) but has overtones of H.G.Wells as it seems to use various methods of 'shooting' the toy soldiers with projectiles .


and I can make out enough of the words to get the jist of it I think .


I've never heard of this book and don't think it was ever reprinted or translated .


It has photos of some of the figures used in the game , flats or semi-flats ?


This advertisement is in the back of the book . This is a fascinating book and seems very rare to buy and probably very expensive so we are lucky to be able to view it on the above link .









 

14 comments:

  1. An excellent looking book Tony! That catapult looks quite powerful and would probably destroy a lot of figures! Although with the ad at the end, that seems to be what they wanted, to sell more soldiers!

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    1. Yes a high casualty rate would be good for business .

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  2. Cracking find!! Very interesting piece of wargaming history, the figures do look like flats, wish I could read Swedish!!

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    1. I have never heard of it before - I too wish I could read Swedish !

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  3. Great find!
    Now to find a Swedish reading volunteer hero to translate it for us!

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    1. Ps. Might be a mix of flats and semiflats but I'm sure some of them are semiflats. In fact I suspect some are homecast, the style is very similar to some figures homecast from antique semiflat moulds that I seen.

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    2. Yes pity it has never been translated , the unfortunate publication date (1914) won't have helped .

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  4. Yes I think some of them might be semi-flats

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  5. Fascinating post, Tony,
    Michael

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    1. That book is very interesting - if only I read Swedish .

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  6. Fantastic find Tony - I had a good look through it and found some early flat Boy Scout figures https://tabletopscoutingwidegames.wordpress.com/2022/08/11/var-redo-alltid-redo-swedish-flat-tin-soldier-scouts-1914/

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    1. Pity these figures and the book aren't still available .

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