High Heel Shoes

 

Contradictions Of High Heel Shoes

Fraught with contradiction, high heel shoes paradoxically hinder movement so that you can increase it, at the least in appearance. Standing in heels, a girl shows herself already half-walking while in the very same time reducing the length of her step, fostering the false impression of speed while indicating the potential of an imminent fall. The higher and more unstable the high heel, the much more evidently these contradictions are expressed.

 

Precursors To High Heel Shoes

The majority of the lower class in ancient Egypt walked without footwear, but figures on murals dating from 3500 B.C. show an early version of shoes worn mostly by the higher classes. These were actually leather pieces held together with lacing that was frequently arranged to look like the symbol of "Ankh", which represents life. But you can find also some depictions of both upper-class men and women wearing heels, in all probability for ceremonial purposes. Egyptian butchers also wore heels, to help them walk above the blood of dead beasts.

In ancient Greece and Rome, platform sandals called kothorni, later referred to as buskins during the Renaissance, were shoes with high wood or cork soles that were preferred especially amongst actors who would wear shoes of various heights to indicated varying social status or significance of characters. In ancient Rome, sex trade wasn't outlawed and female prostitutes were readily identified by their high heels.

In the Middle Ages high heel shoes became incredibly high, up to thirty inches in some cases!