Hobnails and city life

[MARCvSVIBIvSMAvRINvS]

Maybe, like the Japanese, they didnt wear the hobnailed shoes inside the house, or wore non-nailed shoes..

I for one think that in the cities there was so much dirt in the streets it wouldnt have made a tremendous difference....

also on statues you hardly ever see hobnails, and in Rome itself a lot of the higher class seem to wear some kind of slipper, or goe barefoot...

who knows......

M.VIB.M.

[arklore70]

This is all just me thinking a bit out of the box here...but caligae are small and light enough that a trooper could easily have a second pair. I have read from a few sources that a pair was to last about 6 months before they were trashed.

Now having putt more than a few years into military service, most troops I know have a few extra pair of boots, to include one for inspections as well as a pair to just beat about in the bush to trash and thrash....

So that said..how likely would it be that they had a modified pair with the hob nails removed or pulled out for inside and garrison duty?

I would think hob nail would ruin just about any type of floor after a bit of marching on it by the century.

I also know that a different style of flat footed marching may have also been developed to allow for hob nailed walking about in garrison and city life, but that seems a bit unnatural to me and would seem to cause back issues.

This is all speculation....thoughts?

Cheers!!

Mike

[Ebusitanus]

My problem is/was not so much the even floor, slippery as they might have been. The problem came on even so slight inclinations on the polished or worn out floor. On even ground you can get somewhat used to walk in such a careful way that you can keep some sort of ballance. But those inclinations...Oh my Gods!
But this is farily in my humble opinion a matter of common sense. Who would patrol a city or some wall only to be fearing for his life at every step? The easiest explanation would see footware without the nails in such conditions.