09-07-2013, 04:08 PM
Quote:The argument really does seem to be as unsophisticated as this. Small shoes must be ladies' shoes. (If only soles survive, I'm not sure how you draw your distinction between "simple" and "decorative" -- can you explain please?)
It's clearer if you can see the actual shoes I'm discussing (thanks to the aforementioned technology mismatch I can't screenshot them at the moment). The fine shoe I was referring to had hobnails of unusually small size (4mm) arranged into a decorative pattern (which I believe was more prevalent in much later periods). 'Simple' boots had larger hobnails arranged in a functional pattern. That's obviously a highly subjective reading (there's no reason why a woman couldn't have worn a 'simple' patterned boot), and many more decorative elements will have been found on the uppers. Sexing on the basis of these distinctions is highly problematic, which was why I raised gendering as a possible alternative approach to these different styles.
The only realistic way to sex a shoe is to go by size, and the best you can get out of that is that the largest shoes will more likely be male than female. However, it also means you cannot firmly state than smaller shoes were not worn by women or girls.
Quote:In my opinion, stating that women lived there requires a rather more sophisticated argument than the presence of a few small shoes. So far, I haven't seen anyone make this argument.
I'm afraid I can't access your discussion article at the moment so I can't really respond directly to that. The flip side of the issue you raise is that we also can rarely firmly establish the presence of men within these structures, as the same concerns over material culture that would cast doubt over female presence must also be applied to them. Carol van Driel-Murray raised this point here:
Driel-Murray, C.v. 2008. ‘Those who wait at home: the effect of recruitment on women in the Lower Rhine area.’ In U. Brandl (ed) Frauen und Römisches Militär: Beiträge eines Runden Tisches in Xanten vom 7. bis 9. Juli 2005. BAR Int. Ser. 1759. Oxford: Archaeopress, 82-91.
The rest of that volume (as the title suggests) contains further interesting material in this regard, including a paper by Penelope Allison preceding her Internet Archaeology article that highlights female labour roles within other military sites on the continent.
