Footprints on the Past: Preliminary Observations of the Footwear from Vasa

Summary

This is an abstract from the session entitled "Expressions of Social Space and Identity: Interior Furnishings and Clothing from the Swedish Warship Vasa of 1628." , at the 2020 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology.

Footwear preserves the physical imprint of the wearer, recording anthropometric data such as foot size, gait, and pathology. Prior to the 17th-century, it was also one of the first items of clothing produced in standardized sizes on an industrial scale. The Vasa collection includes more than 6000 leather fragments, most from footwear, including shoes, boots, and overshoes. These were made by a variety of techniques with unique departures from other known 17th-century finds, especially the well-known collections from English colonial sites of the period. The assemblage also includes tools and materials for making and repairing shoes, such as shoe lasts, awls, thread, pegs and wax, which reveal the presence of this skill among the crew, and give some idea of how footwear was maintained at sea. This paper will present the results of the initial reconnaissance of the collection in advance of its detailed documentation, with observations of significant features.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Expressions of Social Space and Identity: Interior Furnishings and Clothing from the Swedish Warship Vasa of 1628.   •
• Society for Historical Archaeology 2020

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Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Society for Historical Archaeology

Record Identifiers

PaperId(s): 785