18916 shoes&pattens9

39

Shoes from London siłes, 1100-1450

ponent of the assemblages. These may have been replaced in part by a new type of all-leather patten which, it is suggested {cf. below, p. 101 and Figs. 139-40), were not worn as overshoes but simply over the hose. Among the shoes themselves two very different types are dominant which, when allowance is madę for the large number of uncer-tain fragments, were probably present at both sites in similar proportions. One, the side-laced ankle-shoe or boot (boots reaching about a third of the height to the knee seem to have been the morę common fashion), was a style which had a long ancestry, albeit in a less standardised form and with slight differences in construction. The other, the front-opening buckled ankle-shoe or Iow boot, was an entirely new style, although it perhaps should be regarded as a replacement for the front-laced ankle-shoe of the late 14th century with which it shared many features of design and construction, both overall and in detail.

But it was the technical developments of the early 15th century which are of the greatest signi-ficance. In the construction of some ankle-shoe uppers the two-part method was taken a stage

Buckie )

5

Front -\ Laced /

Side- \ Laced /

Front - \ Latchet/

Side - \ Latchet/

BuckleA Latchet/

Not \ Known /

i:

J Si

10

10

10

10

10

10

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Modern Child Sizes

Modern Adult Sizes

10