The Crispin Colloquy

Michael,

You can write to the good lady that organizes the Zlin conference, Mirka Stybrova, and ask her to buy the proceedings books from the first three. This year's ought to be out in print by Spring '05 m.stybrova@seznam.cz

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"I'm a bit confused about this. You said to brace the rand after gluing it to the cork by "sewing across zig-zag fashion". You mean across the sole from left to right, etc?"
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Yes.

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" I'm assuming this would be left just until the paste/glue is dry which holds the rand to the cork and then removed before attaching the outsole, correct?"
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Nope. You leave the bracing in place, just lay the leather outer sole right on top.

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"Correct, it's a loosely inspired plausible interpretation."
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That's cool. I was just curious whether it was a stitch-for-stitch exact copy of some existing boot was all. It's fine if it isn't. I realize there are few complete medieval examples to copy, like there are from the 1600s and later periods.

Good luck on boot #2

I realize there are few complete medieval examples to copy, like there are from the 1600s and later periods.

Be nice if there were more, certainly. The ecclesiastical shoes are cool, but I think have a really limited appeal.

Marc

You can write to the good lady that organizes the Zlin conference, Mirka Stybrova, and ask her to buy the proceedings books from the first three. This year's ought to be out in print by Spring '05

Thanks. I'll look into it. Any idea what the books cost?

Nope. You leave the bracing in place, just lay the leather outer sole right on top.

Now I'm confused. If the rand is being pulled in by the bracing stitch, how do you sew it to the outer sole? Sorry to be so dense, I'm just not very good at visualizing something from a text description. I'm too visual.

That's cool. I was just curious whether it was a stitch-for-stitch exact copy of some existing boot was all. It's fine if it isn't. I realize there are few complete medieval examples to copy, like there are from the 1600s and later periods.

Speaking of which, in looking for any information I could find online for the Zlin conference, I found an interesting website about a paper presented at the 2001 conference. You and Marc are probably already aware of it, but others may be interested. It is on a cache of artifacts discovered in a building in Kempten, Germany including a large number of shoes, some complete. The collection dates from around 1470 - 1550. I was especially interested in the illustration marked figure 7. It shows multiple drawings of one particular shoe in the cache. One with lacing still partially intact. The laces travel diagonally, though there isn't enough remaining to determine whether the pattern crosses over itself or is just a diagonal ladder. Interesting nonetheless. It would also seem to show a tongue, though this, too is unclear.

Site is here:
http://www.uni-bamberg.de/~ba5am1/info/shoes.htm

There you go, Marc! Now you have an extant shoe with surviving lacing! Heh.

In trying to find a bit more information about this Kempten find, I stumbled upon a mid - late 15th century painting by Andrea del Verrocchio entitled "Tobias and the Angel" which clearly shows mid-calf high boots, laced up the inside in a diagonal ladder style. These do not have a tongue, as the color of the hose is visible through the lacing.

You can see it here:
http://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/cgi-bin/WebObjects.dll/CollectionPublisher.woa /wa/work?searchString=Verrocchio&searchField=Artist%20Name&collectionName=&workN umber=NG781

Very nice painting BTW, and the Javascript Zoom function allows for good, closeup views of details like the lacing.

Michael,

The proceedings books are, if I recall, in the $10 each range. There's one from '94, '97, and '00.

Sorry if I confused you on the rand bracing. I don't have a scanner, nor a fancy drawing program to do sketches--I wish I did. Let me try this:

Sew the rand to the boot/shoe. Stick in your cork sole. Pull the rand up tight around the sides of the cork, then over the bottom edge. The rand ought to be cut wide enough to cover the sides of the cork, then fold over and lay flat on the bottom by maybe a 1/2". This 1/2" allowance is what you brace across, and is hidden under the outer sole. When you lay the leather outer sole on to stitch it, you're stitching through the folded edge of the rand--in the side, across the "corner", then out the bottom bit and on through the outer sole. Make better sense now? You're piercing the rand twice with the same poke of the awl IOW.

The Kempten find, and the guy who was dealing with it, Rainer Ans....? dropped off my radar a few years ago. No updates. He wasn't at the this year's conference. Sorry. If I'm not dreaming, the Bata Shoe Museum, in Toronto, has a more or less complete medieval boot, but it may have been "assembled" out of parts by some unscrupulous restorer/dealer. You might check their website for photos. I think they have it up.

Nice painting, 'Tobias & Angel'.

The proceedings books are, if I recall, in the $10 each range. There's one from '94, '97, and '00.

Cool. I can probably afford that in a couple of weeks.

Sorry if I confused you on the rand bracing. I don't have a scanner, nor a fancy drawing program to do sketches--I wish I did.

Don't worry about it. It's not your fault I'm kind of an idiot sometimes! Heh.

Sew the rand to the boot/shoe. Stick in your cork sole. Pull the rand up tight around the sides of the cork, then over the bottom edge. The rand ought to be cut wide enough to cover the sides of the cork, then fold over and lay flat on the bottom by maybe a 1/2". This 1/2" allowance is what you brace across, and is hidden under the outer sole. When you lay the leather outer sole on to stitch it, you're stitching through the folded edge of the rand--in the side, across the "corner", then out the bottom bit and on through the outer sole. Make better sense now? You're piercing the rand twice with the same poke of the awl IOW.

Ah! I was trying to visualize having the rand cover the edge of the outer sole. You're talking about sewing the rand to the upper (flesh) surface of the outsole, not the edge. Gotcha. Now it makes sense.

The Kempten find, and the guy who was dealing with it, Rainer Ans....? dropped off my radar a few years ago. No updates. He wasn't at the this year's conference. Sorry.

Too bad. The article is still interesting, especially the stuff on the double layered heel stiffeners and the like. I keep telling myself I need to make myself some court poulaines as well and I may try out some of the techniques described by Herr Atzbach.

If I'm not dreaming, the Bata Shoe Museum, in Toronto, has a more or less complete medieval boot, but it may have been "assembled" out of parts by some unscrupulous restorer/dealer. You might check their website for photos. I think they have it up.

Unfortunately, they don't seem to have any photos of it on their website. I'll look around. Perhaps they've published collection catalogues with photos of it.

There you go, Marc! Now you have an extant shoe with surviving lacing! Heh.

I probably phrased it badly - there are plenty of shoes that have been found with bits of old lacing, but none that I know of that were still completely laced as they were when they were being worn.

But as was mentioned earlier, we have illustrations to suggest how things likley were done - such as ladder lacing.

Marc

Michael,

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"Ah! I was trying to visualize having the rand cover the edge of the outer sole. You're talking about sewing the rand to the upper (flesh) surface of the outsole, not the edge. Gotcha. Now it makes sense."
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From what I could see in your photo, the rand was sewed into the inseam, up there with the upper and sole [insole] just fine. My comments were about the lower stitching where your leather outer sole was stitched. The rand, there, forms an "L". The "foot of the "L" goes underneath the cork and is braced. The outer sole is stitched through the corner of the "L". The edge of the leather outer sole is exposed, not hidden by/under the rand at all.

Rainer Atzbach... that was it, yes, Atzbach. He was working on that project I recollect as his PhD thesis or something, so it might be "Dr. Atzbach" by now.

You might e-mail Bata and see if they have any images of their medieval shoes they could send you. They've published several small "popular" monographs that illustrate shoes in their collection. It might be in one of those.

Just mentioning it - there are still several sheos from Bata shown at:

http://www.medievallife.com/Pages/Bata_Shoe_Museum1.htm
http://www.medievallife.com/Pages/Bata_Shoe_Museum2.htm
http://www.medievallife.com/Pages/Bata_Shoe_Museum3.htm

Marc

Just mentioning it - there are still several shoes from Bata shown at:

http://www.medievallife.com/Pages/Bata_Shoe_Museum1.htm
http://www.medievallife.com/Pages/Bata_Shoe_Museum2.htm
http://www.medievallife.com/Pages/Bata_Shoe_Museum3.htm

Marc

Well, I finally broke down and picked up a copy of Stepping Through Time and Shoes and Pattens (as well as the companion volume Dress Accessories) and they've been incredibly helpful. Cleared up several pieces of confusion I had, especially about sole construction. I also noticed I screwed up on one of the construction details of my boots. I put the vamp side-seam on the outside of the foot rather than the inside. Whoops! Guess it's a good thing I didn't wind up making what I'd originally intended; side-lace boots. I'd have really screwed those up! I've got some more pictures below:

First are a couple more photos of the last.

And some photos of the second boot in construction.
Vamp nailed to last.
Heel Stiffener and Side-seam.

And finally a shot of the sole edge-on before piercing.

I'll try to remember to get a shot of one of the lasts side-on on the next roll. The boot shown is now a bit further on. The insole/rand seam is done and I'm working on the quarters. I found the patterns I'd made for the quarters and tongue, so its going faster than I'd anticipated.

Hey Marc, a quick anecdote for you. In stitching the insole to the vamp, I tried piercing the vamp both from the vamp-side (as is shown in period illustrations) and from the sole-side (as is apparently the modern method). I did find that it was much easier to make a smooth, tight seam using the medieval method. When piercing from the sole-side, I tended to bite too far up the vamp, keeping the seam from being able to be pulled fully tight, and making a more jagged, uneven stitch. Piercing from the vampside took longer, but worked better. It allowed me to make sure the pieces were properly aligned and allowed me to control the hole positions more carefully. I did pre-hole the sole, however, so I was just piercing through the vamp into existing holes in the sole. Of course, all this could simply due to me being a poor stitcher.

Were you using a curved awl or a straight awl? I find that holing the soles first and then stabbing from the vamp side later with a straight awl much easier. I'm glad it worked for you too.

Marc

The piercing in the vamp was done with a straight, large glover's needle. The holes in the sole were done with a curved awl, though the curve is not a smooth arc from tip up. It starts a bit up from the tip and is more a sharp bend than a curve. The tip and front part of the blade are almost straight. It mostly allows me to keep my hands out of the way while preholing the sole.

Well, this will likely be my last useless waste of bandwidth and screen space for a little while as I'm finally finished with the boots. (And there was much rejoicing. yay.) I'm happy to report that the pair show only minor variation between the two (and some of that was on purpose). I've got a last few pictures to share below and then I promise I'll leave you guys alone for a while. Heh.

First up is a shot of both sides of one of the lasts. Please don't think this is a period style of last! It doesn't seem to match anything I've seen pictures of. At least they worked, though.


Next, a side-on shot of the outer sole and the cork insert before assembly. You can see that I skived both the leather and the cork to give a gradual slope to the sole. They both start as two layers at the heel and thin out to one each by the toe. The end of the top layer of cork is just behind the ball of my foot.


And a shot of the outer sole while being pre-holed. I also grooved the sole both to aid in the pre-holing and to protect the stitches. Is there any evidence this was done in the middle ages?


Also, a shot of one of the boots with its lace removed and the throat opened. Note that I now think this style of tongue is totally wrong for medieval shoes, but didn't know it when I started.


Finally, a shot of them on me. For your continued ocular health and my personal well-being, I've cropped out all the extraneous fatty deposits lumped on top of these fine examples of coulda-shoulda-woulda. I've also tweaked the contrast and color balance to bring out detail which was lacking in the original scan. You can just make out the spiral lacing they now have. I was surprised to find that the single lace tied to itself held fine all day without loosening once. I would have figured the half-knot would slip pretty quickly.

Michael,
Not at all bad. They look great.

Marc

Michael,
You did a fine job with the boots. If I were viewing a play, they would closely enough resemble what would be worn in medeval times. Unless you are modeling them in a room full of historians, you are probably ok.

Steve

Heh. I know. I'm not showing them to a room full of medieval historians, but I am in the SCA. Granted, footwear is largely ignored in the Society and I'm probably more of a period Nazi than most of the others in my group (not saying much considering the inaccuracies in my boots).

A question for Marc: I'm thinking of making myself some court poulaines and I was wondering how to do the longer pike. I'm assuming I'll need to make a new pair of lasts with a longer toe, but is there any evidence of lasts with toes that go all the way down the pike, or did they just let the longer amount of material for the vamp and sole hang off the toe of the last? I know there's evidence that the toe was sewn after the shoe was turned.

You should be able to use the ones you already have. If you aren't going to sew up the pikes until after they are turned (which is how you'd do it) you really don't need to mess with trying to carve out huge spikes, or at least that is my opinion. The longest points I've seen on lasts were from sketches of a last from 1400 Lubeck, and after reproducing that last, I can say that the shoes that come off it aren't as pointed as you would expect just seeing the last (OTOH, they are right there with the shoes from that period in style ).

BTW, I expect that an average roomful of medieval historians would have no clue whether they were right or not. I think we've covered the major inaccuracies they have in this thread (with the exception of the layered cork, and I am familiar with the trauma of getting solid cork - there now that's been covered too ). All theings considered the only thing that anyone has any room to gig you on with them is social, not structural. They look fine.

Marc

The following URL was posted to the medieval leatherworking list, and I think it's very educational.

>Subject: Adventures in Leatherwork ;-)
>I think you guys will enjoy this ;-)
>http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=80915&item=5549346158

Turnshoes should not be made to exactly the same measurements as the person's foot. When you turn them inside out they get smaller. The thicker the leather you use the more noticable it is.

Marc

Marc & Michael
Ckeck these out they are pretty cool .I think they are made in the Ukraine .Looks like good craftsmanship. Here's the url.let me know what you think check out his other stuff. http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=19255&item=5543059127&tc= photo

Enjoy
Larry Waller

Looking and the boots and the shoes, they look fine for costuming where actual historical accuracy is not a serious criterion (i.e. the notations he gives of SCA/LARP/LOTR/REN is perfectly correct). If that's too harsh, I apologize, I haven't gotten much sleep lately.

The boots appear to be based on a Mongol concept, although I notice that he claims they are based on Persian boots - this is possible although the Persian boots I'm familiar with don't look anything like this (I may not be familiar with the specific boots he's working from). If they are based on the Mongol, there are other stylistic issues. In either case, the machine stitching is going to be a source of historical issues.

The shoes he is also selling (click on the picture below the main boots picture)are neither "Celtic" nor "Medieval", nor for that matter do they have anything to do with the picture of the archaeological shoe shown at the bottom of the page (as should be obvious to anyone who's actually paying any attention). They appear to be machine made in a modern construction style.

That having been said, the leather for both looks really good, and the craftsmanship on the pyrogravure is decent (My suspicion it's done with a heated iron stamp, but I'd need to see it up close to tell for sure).

FYI, my issues aren't with people making pseudo-medievalish footwear - anything that gets people out of tennis shoes and biker boots is an improvement. My issues tend to be with people doing it and implying that they are accurate.

Marc

Marc,

I have to admit the laugh i just got out of your ebay link (http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=80915&item=5549346158)
to the maroon shoes had me in "stitches" for awhile. I decide a comment was imperative! Mind you I laughed out of empathy. And only wish I had the creativity to sell my mistakes so light heartedly.

David Ulan

Peter Camper, with links to Rousseau, on 18thc. shoes, straights versus lefts and rights, etc.:

http://www.geocities.com/Paris/Chateau/6110/shoe.htm

You history wonks are gonna love this one...really and truely "through the mists of time"

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2005/08/050821233037.htm


Tight Stitches
DWFII--HCC Member

You are right, that was very interesting. Not conclusive, but definately suggestive

Marc