Читать книгу The Art of the Shoe - Marie-Josèphe Bossan - Страница 10

As in Egypt, the most popular shoe in Greece was the sandal. The Homeric heroes of the Iliad and The Odyssey wear sandals with bronze soles, while the gods wear sandals made of gold. Agamemnon, legendary king of Mycenae, protected his legs with the help of leg armor fastened with silver hooks.

Sandals figure in a story about the Greek philosopher Empedocles, born around 450 BC in Agrigentum. As the story goes, Empedocles wanted people to believe he had ascended into heaven, so he dove into the opening of Mt. Etna. The volcano swallowed him, but ejected his sandals intact, in this way revealing the suicide’s hoax.

Archaeological discoveries in the tombs at Vergina confirm that wealthy Macedonians during the reign of Phillip II (382 BC-336 BC) wore sandals with soles of gold or gilded silver. The Greek sandal, worn by men and women alike, had a leather or cork sole of variable thickness, differentiated right and left feet, and attached to the foot with straps. Originally simple shoes, sandals later displayed elegant complexity. Examples are found on sculptures from the period, such as the sandals worn by Diana of the Hunt (Louvre Museum, Paris). Attic vases show certain figures wearing laced boots called endromides, also known as embas when trimmed with a flap.

As for other models of Greek footwear, the pointed shoe of the Hittite variety, with which the Ionians were long familiar, never reached mainland Greece, although it was depicted by Greek vase painters who wanted to give an oriental character to their figures. Aeschylus (525 BC-456 BC) is credited with inventing the cothurne. Worn by the actors in Greek tragedies who played the roles of heroes and gods, the cothurne had an elevated cork sole that increased height at the expense of stability. This theatrical shoe adjusted equally to fit both feet, whence the expression “more versatile than a cothurne.” It is interesting to note that the cothurne, because of its height, represents the beginnings of a heel, which would remain unknown to Antiquity, but would appear later in Italy at the end of the 16th century.

One Greek custom was reserved for courtesans: the wearing of sandals embellished with precious stones. It was said that their studded soles left an unambiguous message in the sand that said, “follow me.” The rich variety of Greek footwear goes against the advice of Plato (428 BC-348 BC), who advocated walking barefoot.

15. Diana the Huntress, copy from the 2nd century B. C., adaptation of a Greek original from the 4th century B. C., attributed to Léo Charès, marble, The Louvre, Paris.

16. Attican cup with red figures, attributed to Epiktétos. Around 500 BC. Agora Museum, Athens.

17. Attica urn with black figures, representing a shoe repairer’s workshop. Around 520–510 BC. Boston Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.