A Walk Through The History of Shoes

Shelving unit with shoes

Footwear is so integral to the human experience, it’s hard to imagine a time in history when it didn’t exist. To be without shoes in modern life would pose a significant problem — can you imagine leaving your home and walking even a single city block barefoot? The degree to which footwear is essential for enhanced mobility means that it arguably could even be considered our first vehicle. Whether you’re a bona fide shoe-lover or someone who takes footwear for granted, it’s worth thinking about the lineage of these things we put on our feet to carry ourselves through the world. Let’s go on a quick walkabout to explore the history of footwear.

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Photo credit: George Ostertag/ Alamy Stock Photo

First Steps

How far back in human history do shoes go? Anthropologists estimate that humans first began wearing some form of sturdy foot covering at least 40,000 years ago, based on changes in toe bones. The oldest surviving pair of shoes is what’s referred to as the Fort Rock sandals, woven sagebrush bark sandals made by Indigenous people in what’s now southeast Oregon and northern Nevada about 10,200 to 9,300 years ago (according to radiocarbon dating). Similar variants of these sandals were made by the Klamath Tribes up until the 20th century.

As for fully enclosed shoes, archaeologists made a surprising discovery during a 2010 dig in an Armenian cave: well-preserved shoes made from tanned cowhide that date back 5,500 years. In other words, the world’s oldest leather shoes. Aside from being made of a familiar modern material, the shoes were also laced along a center seam. Renowned designer Manolo Blahnik commented, “It is astonishing how much this shoe resembles a modern shoe!”

Photo credit: Culture Club/ Hulton Archive via Getty Images

From Sandals to Pointed Toes

Throughout antiquity, footwear refinements were made as new materials were harvested and traded. Sandals that adorned the feet of Egyptian royalty were sleek and look strikingly like flip-flop prequels, as do Japanese geta. Quilted hemp sandals emerged from China and traveled the Silk Road. Roman sandals were made lighter with cork soles and may have been the first footwear built in accordance with the shape of the foot and toes, as well as the first that differentiated between right and left.

By the year 1305, King Edward I’s decree that an inch should equate to three dried barleycorns became the basis for English shoe sizing. That reference standard soon became relevant beyond the size of the whole shoe, as a fashion craze for shoes with exaggeratedly long points gripped 14th-century Europe. Known as poulaines, or crakows, the shoes were a status symbol in the truest sense; the impracticality of the design and its prevention of the wearer engaging in any kind of labor was the, well, point. The longer the poulaine, the more prosperity the shoe conveyed. Perhaps not surprisingly, poulaines also came to be considered racy, and clergymen disdained them as “claws of devils.” By 1463, English King Edward IV passed a sumptuary law limiting toe length to 2 inches (or, six dried barleycorns). This law, combined with the changing tides of fashion, caused late-15th-century shoe style preferences to veer toward a wide-toe shoe (and yes, eventually the width of the shoe was restricted, too). But even as shoe designs changed, a link between footwear and status remained.

Who Wears the Heels?

The high heel was originally a type of riding footwear worn for centuries by the Persian military, but in 1599, when Shah Abbas I sent a diplomatic envoy to the courts of Spain, Russia, and Germany, the heel caught on with nobility throughout Western Europe. Echoing the message conveyed in the past by the poulaine, the impractical (for anything other than gripping stirrups) design of the heel was an indication of the wearer’s leisurely lifestyle. In 1670, French King Louis XIV codified the status of the heel in an official capacity, declaring in edict that high heels were to be worn by noblemen only. Yes, men.

It was during the Enlightenment of the 18th century that the gendering of the high heel shifted. Individualism and ideas of merit and hard work rendered the idle aristocrat unfashionable. Productivity became intertwined with masculinity, and the symbol of leisure that was the high heel was then considered unmanly. As men adopted lower heels, heel heights for women increased, and the function shifted. For women, high heels were intended to conceal the wearer’s feet beneath her dress, to make the feet appear smaller and dainty.

Photo credit: Joe Raedle/ Getty Images News via Getty Images

A Shoe for Every Use

The Industrial Revolution of the 19th century changed the course of design and function for shoes (like it did for nearly every material thing). Factories sped up manufacturing, sewing machines allowed for more embroidery and canvas work, and new processes (such as vulcanization) and dyes allowed for a greater variety of materials to be used in shoemaking. The North British Rubber Company (now Hunter) formed in 1856 and began making rubberized versions of Wellington boots that were eminently waterproof. Pumps emerged as fashionable women’s shoes in the 1870s.

The 20th century saw the creation of shoe brands and styles that are staples today, many originally intended for specific sports. Canvas and rubber-soled Keds were created by U.S. Rubber in 1916 and soon marketed toward tennis players. The Converse All Star emerged the following year for basketball. The B.F. Goodrich company tapped Jack Purcell to design his namesake shoe for badminton, a design that was acquired by Converse in 1972. Paul Sperry created the Sperry Top-Sider in 1935. Adidas grew as a soccer shoe company in the ’50s, while Nike famously began as a running-shoe company in 1964.

The 21st century is still young, but dare we say the controversial Crocs (perhaps the shoe world’s version of pineapple on pizza) have earned a place in history since their inception in 2002? Or perhaps the equally polarizing “minimalist shoe”? Both designs are unconventional, arguably ostentatious, and seem to communicate something about the priorities of the wearer — a tale as old as a poulaine.