Part of the Sandown Park plunder were these two knights made in France by CBG Mignot. The paper label on the plinth helpfully tells us that this is Francis 1st, or at least it's his horse, sadly the rider is not Francis but a knight in armour by CBG Mignot who happened to be in the same £1 box along with the foot figure beside him.
The horse trappings are specific to the horse for Francis 1st, which is a rather nice personality figure in court clothes, so I will probably remount the rider when I find a standard Mignot medieval horse for him. The figure of Francis 1st was originally issued without the wooden plinth, which was a feature added later when the historical personalities were individually boxed and sold through high end tourist outlets. I'm tempted to remove the plinth as I don't really care for this sort of thing.
The figures are cast in solid metal, a lead/tin mix, the arms bent into position then weapons and shield soldered on, the heads are cast separately and plug into the body to create some variety. The mounted horse and rider carry no makers mark but the foot figure has "CBG made in France" under the base, which tells us this is late production as earlier examples were unmarked. CBG relates to Cuperly Blondel Gerbeau the three early proprietors of the firm which began producing toy soldiers in 1832, in 1912 Henri Mignot succeeded Gerbeau and added his name to the firm, all four had been related through marriage.
The two new figures will join a small existing collection of CBG Mignot medieval figures: centre above is a personality figure of Louis XI (Louis the Prudent), the horse carries no mark under the base and the residue of glue suggests he may have been mounted on a plinth like the one for Francis 1st. He is flanked by two knights who are essentially the same figure with arms bent into different positions and separate heads plugged in. Both horses are simply marked "Made in France".
More examples of how CGB Mignot used the same body pose with different plug in heads and weapons soldered on, the two bowmen are the same, as are the swordsman and spearman advancing, the knight standing with pike is the same as the new knight with lance and shield in the first pic. All of these foot figures carry no makers mark. Dating CGB Mignot figures is very difficult as they produced the same poses in the same manner over an extended period, the only differentiation being changes in the hue of colours used to paint them, therefore it's a skill only achieved after many years experience of handling them.
