Here are some shoes that I just made. Now, here are the specs on it. There are three pieces to the uppers. Two front pieces and the piece that wraps around the heel. They are hand stitched on to a sole, and that sole is glued down to another sole. Since these shoes are made in the fashion that someone of a bit more wealth could afford, they do not have the marching studs on the bottom. These people in Persia would not be on the march, but rather on horse. All pieces are made of extremely fine grade leather that is tanned traditionaly and not the chrome tanning of today. The lacing is the important part. The lacing I used is also leather made from thick elk and it is capped in brass tips. This would be an everyday walking shoe. I made one change to it by lacing it this way. The Sassanian's would use silk decorative bands to tie their shoes when on horse back. A sign of their status and class. Those ties would be tied in a typical bow tie fashion, with the ends hanging down about 6 to 12 inches from the bottom of the shoes in an ornate fashion. The silk tie at the ends would be pressed in an accordian style fashion. Well, for my working around the horses, this isnt practical, I dont have the two grooms that would have the horses ready for me in my stone stables. So, if I were to do the silk ties, then I would meerly, add them over.<br>
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Finally, the glue used for the sole is a hide glue made of sinew which dries as tough as anything known to man. You actually hammer the pieces together.<br>
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The next pair I make will be about 8 inches taller, with a different tie piece, they will also, not have the center ridge. That center ridge will be replaced with a leather strip that will have brass studs on it. Then, the uppers will be strapped down or laced down with fine lacing. Then a pair of very ornate gaitor, legging or half chaps (which ever term your familiar with) will cover the legs.<br>
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Its been an ordeal for me choosing between making full leg boots, or the shoes and half chaps. I chose the shoes and half chaps because they are more ornate.<br>
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Anyway, I hope you enjoy and would love to hear your comments. You guys really know your stuff and I love reading how you help each other out.<br>
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<img src="http://www.tridian.com/ardeshir/pers_shoes/pers_shoes1.jpg" style="border:0;"/><br>
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<img src="http://www.tridian.com/ardeshir/pers_shoes/pers_shoes2.jpg" style="border:0;"/> <p></p><i></i>
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Beautiful shoes, Ardeshir!<br>
I must confess that I know nothing about Persian footwear but I am puzzled by the presence of heels in the shoes. Here in Europe, heeled shoes didn't appear until the XVI-XVIIth century CE ( nothing related with this post, Ardeshir, just a joke for those on the Mel Gibson's thread!)<br>
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Aitor <p></p><i></i>
It\'s all an accident, an accident of hands. Mine, others, all without mind, from one extreme to another, but neither works nor will ever.
Rolf Steiner
Thats funny. I think I kinda got what you were talking about. Well, as for the heels, I saw two shoes in Iran, one a pair of boots and the other shoes, that had heels. It always puzzled me why the Romans didnt have heels. So, when I made these, I chose to make them after what I saw in the example of heels. Now the heels that I saw were about an 1/4 of an inch shorter. But I chose this for a number of reasons.<br>
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One because I figured that if I am in a performance that I am using stirrups for safety reasons and foregoing accuracy, then a heel that is a bit more pronounced would be more sufficient, and if I use it with latter Sassanian stuff, when stirrups were coming into use, it would make more sense.<br>
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I have a pic of the boot in the Museum in Tehran, and I will be there again in a few weeks and plan on taking better pics of it for reconstruction purposes. Ill see about posting it.<br>
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I will also try and get as many Sassanian/Parthian pics that I can from both of those museums. What will upset most of you, believe it or not, but most of the museums there will not allow you to photograph anything. And they inforce it very strictly. And I mean very strictly.<br>
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Ill see what I can do. <p></p><i></i>
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Ardeshir,<br>
Have you noticed if the kings, etc depicted on the huge wall carvings are wearing heeled or heeless shoes?. That would be an interesting survey...<br>
Changing topic, we'd also love to have close-ups of the equipment that Third century Roman defeated emperors are wearing!<br>
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Aitor <p></p><i></i>
It\'s all an accident, an accident of hands. Mine, others, all without mind, from one extreme to another, but neither works nor will ever.
Rolf Steiner
you know, that is an interesting thing to look for. I have some pretty extensive photos at home of those carvings from my last trip and I will look at them tonight and let you know. I have some pretty awesome photos of Valerian at Shapur's feet. So Ill see what I can look up on it. <p></p><i></i>
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Thanks Ardeshir,<br>
Looking forward to see them!<br>
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Aitor <p></p><i></i>
It\'s all an accident, an accident of hands. Mine, others, all without mind, from one extreme to another, but neither works nor will ever.
Rolf Steiner
Ok, very interesting info. There are two sets of wall carvings that depict the Roman defeat to Shapur. One shows Shapur on his knees, the other is a much much more elaborate carving. It has Shapur holding Valerian's hands while he is paid hommage to by Philip the Arab. This is a much much much more extensive wall carving, showing the Sassanian Heavy Cavalry and much more. But there is an issue, the Bishapur carving does not have the detail that the Nagshe Rustam carving does. Therefore, I cannot tell if it is accurate depiction of footwear. For example, the Sassanian soldiers are not even standing in a proper stance. Their feet point downward as if their feet are dangling. And there is not much detail in the carving on their shoes. So I am not sure if it was not important enough to shoe such detail. So the shoes of Valerian and Philip only show a sock like, generic round foot.<br>
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Now what is interesting, is that in the Shapur carving on Nagshe Rustam, Valerians left foot is not visible in my photo due to the leg from the Cross that its cut into. But his right foot that is back has an interesting detail that I cannot make out. It almost looks like he is wearing gaiters. But I am not certain. I will definitley look more into that. The other foot that the shoe could be visible in, is badly damaged and I do not have a close enough photo of it. I took hundreds of photos and Im going through them one by one.<br>
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The Sassanian carvings are very interesting because of what they choose to detail and not to detail. Tagi Bustan with Khosrow has a very detailed carving of shoes, but I could not get high enough to take good enough photos of it. Its in the upper part of the grotto above the Cataphracts head.<br>
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Anyway, I will let you guys know as soon as possible.<br>
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By the way, how do you add your personal icons next to your name. Ive tried to figure out how to do it and I can seem to get it done.<br>
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Ardeshir <p></p><i></i>
by the way, how do I move this image<br>
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<img src="http://www.tridian.com/ardeshir/Sass-RAT-Icon.jpg" style="border:0;"/><br>
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over to the left underneath my name the way you guys have it?<br>
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Ardeshir <p></p><i></i>
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Ardeshir,<br>
Go to "My control centre", then to "Edit Profile" and write the URL of your photo on the first space. I had my problems with that thing too!<br>
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Aitor <p></p><i></i>
It\'s all an accident, an accident of hands. Mine, others, all without mind, from one extreme to another, but neither works nor will ever.
Rolf Steiner
Thank you very much. That was pretty easy and soooo much better. Thanks a lot.<br>
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Ok, on the shoes thing, I have some interesting news. Both Valerian and Phillip look like they are wearing flat sole shoes. Shoes that are low cut as well. More like a low cut slipper type of a thing. And it looks like they are either wearing a legging of some sort in addition to the shoes or they have their legs wrapped in the cavalry tradition. Something like what English soldiers had in WWI or Japanese soldiers had in WWII. Im not too sure on it because the photo just doesnt reveal the detail. So, I am on it and will let you know more. But I am almost certain of it. <p></p><i></i>
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That's the goal of this forum, to offer mutual help, Ardeshir!<br>
Very interesting, we had detected during Fourth century that, probably on hot climates, soldiers donned off their trousers and used gaiters for protecting their lower legs. Now you tell us that it was done also during the Third century and even by emperors!<br>
Here goes a tentative reconstruction by my re-enactment group of the possible aspect of such gaiters, worn with the kind of military boot typical of Third century:<br>
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<img src="http://www.euskalnet.net/oskarmaestu/Polainas2.jpg" style="border:0;"/><br>
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Aitor <p></p><i></i>
It\'s all an accident, an accident of hands. Mine, others, all without mind, from one extreme to another, but neither works nor will ever.
Rolf Steiner
Aitor,<br>
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That is almost exactly what it looks like he is wearing. Im not sure if it has the area from the ankles up, but the rest of it looks almost exact.<br>
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Ardeshir <p></p><i></i>
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Ardeshir,<br>
It would be great if the carvings would in fact show some more details on the way that puttees and shoes were constructed!<br>
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Aitor <p></p><i>Edited by: <A HREF=http://pub45.ezboard.com/bromanarmytalk.showUserPublicProfile?gid=aitoririarte>Aitor Iriarte</A> at: 3/24/04 9:35 am<br></i>
It\'s all an accident, an accident of hands. Mine, others, all without mind, from one extreme to another, but neither works nor will ever.
Rolf Steiner
Im going to try and see what I can do. If I can get or find something for you guys.<br>
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Ardeshir <p></p><i></i>
Only pair I've done much with was for SCA combat-<br>
<img src="http://home.armourarchive.org/members/owenbrau/boots1.jpg" style="border:0;"/> <p></p><i></i>
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