Le marquis de Lunéville, Lorrainer Horse, 1688

The Dukes of Lorraine had a complicated and difficult relationship with the Kings of France in the 17th Century, culminating in the French invasion of the Duchy in 1670. Stripped of his hereditary lands and titles, Charles V of Lorraine (confusingly also sometimes called Charles IV) served with the Imperial armies of the Hapsburgs in the 1680s and 1690s. One thing which the Dukes of Lorraine were well known for in the mid- and late- 17th Century was the good quality of their cavalry, and the Hapsburgs made good use of that advantage.

Whereas the Governors of the Spanish Netherlands recruited cavalry on a campaign-by-campaign basis, the Lorrainer Horse appears to have been maintained on a more continual (although far from permanent) basis, mirroring what was becoming the practice in the mid- and late-17th Century French armies. This allowed for greater cohesion in the field, and made the recruitment by Imperial armies of Lorrainer (and Alsatian and Burgundian horse) a common feature through the 1640s to the 1690s.

You can trace regiments of Lorrainer Horse, serving with Imperial and Spanish forces, through the campaigns in Flanders in the 1640s (at Rocroi and Lens), through the Franco-Dutch Wars to the Nine Years War, making them suitable for my army of the Spanish Netherlands based around my fictional Flemish Free City of Laarden.

I've also reasoned that, whereas Flemish horse may have preferred to use pistol firearms as a primary weapon for more recently raised cavalry, the Lorrainer horse would have been more inclined, with better training, to use cold steel. In that regard, there's a reasonable chance that makes them closer to French Cheveau-légers than Spanish or Flemish cavalry of the period.

I chose some 25-28mm Dixon Miniatures 'Grand Alliance' figures for the squadron. I went with the backplate and breastplate versions; one source I looked at suggested that the Imperial horse tended to still use heavier armour than the French horse in the 1670s. 

I added some extra greenstuff frills to the officer and the kettedrummer, such as monogrammed pistol holsters, extra lace ribbons and bows on the horses and additional lace cravats. There are also some greenstuff feathers on the hats of the troopers. This was really to try and make the regiment a little more 'French', despite their presence in the Imperial and Spanish forces allying with the Flemish forces in the field.

The squadron shown in the photographs is identified in the order of battle I've been using just as "Lunéville". It's a complete guess, but I'm assuming that it might have been raised near the current town of Lunéville in the commune of Meurthe-et-Moselle in Lorraine, close to the current German border. 

The flag is frankly a bit of a fudge. It's a lovely standard from Flags of War, but I drew a blank in trying to locate standards of the squadron. However, as the troops would have been in Hapsburg service, I can't see any reason why their standard would not have reflected their allegiance to the Hapsburgs.

For those readers curious as to where all this is heading, I’ve another regiment of Walloon horse to finish, and then I’ll be onto the Spanish horse squadrons (which finish the army) and moving on to their French adversaries.