Posted on 08/24/2005 10:06:07 PM PDT by LibWhacker
Sturdy shoes first came into widespread use between 40,000 and 26,000 years ago, according to a US scientist.
Humans' small toes became weaker during this time, says physical anthropologist Erik Trinkaus, who has studied scores of early human foot bones.
He attributes this anatomical change to the invention of rugged shoes, that reduced our need for strong, flexible toes to grip and balance.
The research is presented in the Journal of Archaeological Science.
The development of footwear appears to have affected the four so-called "lesser" toes - excepting the big toe.
Ancient footwear
While early humans living in cold northern climates may have begun covering up their feet to insulate them as early as 500,000 years ago, protective footwear comparable to modern-day shoes is thought to be a much later innovation.
It has been difficult for archaeologists to determine exactly when humans stopped going barefoot, however, because the plant and animal materials used to make prehistoric shoes is highly perishable.
"The oldest shoes in the world are about 9,000 years old, and they're from California," said Professor Trinkaus, of Washington University in St Louis, US.
But by examining the foot bones of early modern humans (Homo sapiens) and Neaderthals (Homo neanderthalensis) dating from 10,000 to 100,000 years ago, Professer Trinkaus says he has determined the period in which footwear became the norm.
Anatomical evidence
He found Neanderthals and early moderns living in Middle Palaeolithic times (100,000 to 40,000 years ago) had thicker, and therefore stronger, lesser toes than those of Upper Palaeolithic people living 26,000 years ago.
A shoe-less lifestyle promotes stronger little toes, says Professor Trinkaus, because "when you walk barefoot, you grip the ground with your toes as a natural reflex". Because hard-soled shoes improve both grip and balance, regularly shod people develop weaker little toes.
To test the theory that the more delicate toes resulted from shoe use, the Washington University researcher compared the foot bones of early Native Americans, who regularly went barefoot, and contemporary Alaskan Inuits, who sported heavy sealskin boots.
Again, he identified chunkier toes in the population that routinely went without shoes. The research suggests shoe-wearers developed weaker toes simply because of the reduced stresses on them during their lifetime; it was not an evolutionary change.
The comparison proves his hypothesis, he says: "It has been suggested in the past that thicker toes and fingers are related to greater blood supply in colder climates, but it just doesn't hold up."
Cultural "explosion"
The advent of footwear occurred during a period Professor Trinkaus describes as "a well-documented archaeological explosion" which also produced a number of other notable human advances.
Paul Mellars, professor of prehistory and human evolution at the University of Cambridge, UK, agrees there were "dramatic changes" in human behaviour at this time. "From 35,000 years ago onward, you see the first art, the first stone tools, and the first personal decorations and jewellery."
More advanced shoe-making skills could have been a product of this overall increase in technological ingenuity.
"There is a strong hint that people were doing more complicated things with ...skins, with special stone tools for cleaning and awls for piercing.
"In view of all these changes, it wouldn't be at all surprising if we saw better shoes," Professor Mellars explained.
You can't actually *walk* in those and I don't care to contemplate what you *are* supposed to do in them....;))
Minnesota / North Dakota here.. Barefoot all summer, occassionally barefoot for breif periods in the winter... ( sauna to snowbank, and back.. )
I climbed many trees and "grabbed" branches as much with my feet as with my hands.. I could readily stand on a branch and keep my balance purely with my gripping toes, without having to resort to hands..
Likewise, picking up stones, pebbles, small branches, kittens, pups, etc.. even learned to tie a square knot with those toes..
Any kind of narrow shoe has always been uncomfortable..
And having to act "civilized" has resulted in deterioration of my skillful toes...
They seldom do any tricks any more..
Spirit Cave Man had shoes and he is 9,400 years old and is from Nevada.
You've got quite a vivid imagination there :)
Not a biologist or anything, but my understanding is that muscle is attached to bone by ligaments and tendons, and bone thickens at the attachment sites with exercise. The more you exercise, the thicker these attachment sites become. So they don't need to examine the muscle tissue directly to tell how heavily muscled the toes were.
Cuz they prolly don't know how to find all of us. Some of us live in climates where they'd never expect.
In my formative years, unless I was in school, I was barefoot nearly year round. Thanks to that, I "evolved" the ability to write with my feet, pick up things as small as a dime with my toes [to hubby's continual amazement/amusement] and can deliver a pretty good pinch with them, if necessary....:))
LOL I remember flip flops & having to build up tolerance to them between my toes every summer. In the fall, had to go through making heels tolerate leather shoes again. Needed a pair of canvas sneaks to wear for swimming in lakes with mucky bottoms & old school shoes were still needed for roller skates.
Pinching seems to be the most common behavior. I always lost toe pinch fights with my brother, cuz his pinch was brutal. After he had children, one of the first things he always tried when one of his babies was fussy was take off their shoes. "No wonder you're unhappy." "Mommy put shoes on you." Coin on carpet, no problem. Coin on a hard floor, no longer can do. My toe writing was a little sloppier than the writing of my left hand, with my left foot the worst.
[I've deigned to wear slip-on sneaks when out in the yard now so I have become somewhat more "civilized" in my old age]...;D
Yeah, me too, but mine are sandals. Have you ever gone somewhere & forget to take any shoes? I forgot to pack any when I went out of town for my grandfather's funeral & no, I wasn't wearing any. We were in a town far from any store selling shoes. Thank goodness my aunt's sister lived in that area & she had a pair I could borrow.
I have to admit to owning some uncomfortable high heels, though no where near as pointy as the pair in that picture. If you can make it into the party wearing 'em, you can plead pain & be free of them for the rest of the night.
Is your second toe longer or shorter than your big toe? It is a known genetic variation, like the ability to curl the tongue. I always figured shorter second toes made for less useful feet.
Cuz they prolly don't know how to find all of us. Some of us live in climates where they'd never expect.
In my formative years, unless I was in school, I was barefoot nearly year round. Thanks to that, I "evolved" the ability to write with my feet, pick up things as small as a dime with my toes [to hubby's continual amazement/amusement] and can deliver a pretty good pinch with them, if necessary....:))
LOL I remember flip flops & having to build up tolerance to them between my toes every summer. In the fall, had to go through making heels tolerate leather shoes again. Needed a pair of canvas sneaks to wear for swimming in lakes with mucky bottoms & old school shoes were still needed for roller skates.
Pinching seems to be the most common behavior. I always lost toe pinch fights with my brother, cuz his pinch was brutal. After he had children, one of the first things he always tried when one of his babies was fussy was take off their shoes. "No wonder you're unhappy." "Mommy put shoes on you." Coin on carpet, no problem. Coin on a hard floor, no longer can do. My toe writing was a little sloppier than the writing of my left hand, with my left foot the worst.
[I've deigned to wear slip-on sneaks when out in the yard now so I have become somewhat more "civilized" in my old age]...;D
Yeah, me too, but mine are sandals. Have you ever gone somewhere & forget to take any shoes? I forgot to pack any when I went out of town for my grandfather's funeral & no, I wasn't wearing any. We were in a town far from any store selling shoes. Thank goodness my aunt's sister lived in that area & she had a pair I could borrow.
I have to admit to owning some uncomfortable high heels, though no where near as pointy as the pair in that picture. If you can make it into the party wearing 'em, you can plead pain & be free of them for the rest of the night.
Is your second toe longer or shorter than your big toe? It is a known genetic variation, like the ability to curl the tongue. I always figured shorter second toes made for less useful feet.
They might also check my theory that shorter toes are the result of people with long toes dying off the evolutionary ladder when their long toes overhung paleolithic footwear and stubbed their toes with killing effect.
Yes, I've gone off and forgotten my shoes.
My one chance to see the Hershey chocolate factory was shot due to the fact that the snobs insisted on footwear whilst visiting.
My second toe is *way* longer than the rest.
If I curl it under I can wear a whole size smaller shoe.
[does that makes us chimps or something?]....;))
Can do the tongue curl as well.
I always looked upon those who couldn't curl their tongues as somehow "handicapped"....LOL!
[and here it is as a rerun just so you won't feel odd about the double post]...;D
Yes, I've gone off and forgotten my shoes.
My one chance to see the Hershey chocolate factory was shot due to the fact that the snobs insisted on footwear whilst visiting.
My second toe is *way* longer than the rest.
If I curl it under I can wear a whole size smaller shoe.
[does that makes us chimps or something?]....;))
Can do the tongue curl as well.
I always looked upon those who couldn't curl their tongues as somehow "handicapped"....LOL!
I was pretty smug about it myself, until I became friend's with someone who has an even rarer tongue ability gene. She can curl hers front to back, as in, fold it back on to itself. Other kids suck their finger or thumb, she sucked the tip of her tongue. She never knew it was genetic or rare, until one of her professors brought it up in class. The prof was shocked to come across someone able to do it. Crossing my fingers, hoping my mouse doesn't go wild on me again.
Birgenstocks?
Are women still self-abusing themselves in this manner? (I really don't know. I'm the Anti-Fashionista, as far as this Girly-Girl stuff goes.)
I remember my Mom and her rows and rows and rows of pretty, sparkly "Party Shoes," as she called them, back in the sixties.
And then I flash forward to her IN her sixties when she had her bunions removed and had seven of her ten toes BROKEN and set with pins to straighten them out again just so she could walk unaided...
Good Golly. Give me a pair of Combat Boots any day over those instruments of torture, LOL! :)
What I can tell you is that the first guy who invented shoes got laid a lot.
In other words, it only took a few hundred years for the invention of shoes to spread right across the planet.
Neanderthals were in ice age europe as early as 400,000 years ago so I imagine it happened right around this time.
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Ancient shoes....hmmmmmm.......
Those wouldn't be Red Ball Jets, would they?
I spent several hours shoe-shopping today and couldn't find a pair that fit decently. Now I know who to blame.
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