Polish Archaeology in the Mediterranean (18.2006(2008))

NAQLUN

EGYPT

only the front part is preserved, thus
providing information on the elements that
are missing in the other shoe. The right shoe
also had a long, decorative tongue, which
had broken away but was found inside the
shoe.
This pair can also be classified as turn
shoes, class IV, type B, variant 3, according
to Montembault's classification (2000: 67).
The sole consisted of a treadsole and an
insole. The saddle stitch of the lasting
seam passes through three layers: from the
top it is a rand, then the upper, and below
it an upturned lip of the insole. Another
stitch visible inside the shoe, running
parallel to the lasting seam, may have
served to attach the treadsole to the insole.
However, since it did not penetrate the
treadsole (and because of the footwear's
precarious condition), it was impossible to
determine exactly how it is attached
without causing damage to it.
All other information was obtained by
examining the better-preserved right shoe.
The upper is made of a single piece of
leather cut to shape and sewn together with
an edge stitch in the back of the heel to form
a butted seam. The heel is strengthened on
the inside with a semicircular reinforcement
piece — a heel stiffener, attached to the upper
with a whip stitch that does not penetrate
the upper, so it does not show on the
outside.
The upper is trimmed at the top with an
edge binging, i.e., a narrow strip attached
along the instep with whip stitches (the
thread of the stitches is very fine). A long
(c. 10 cm), narrow, decorative tongue was
found broken off from the rest of the shoe. It
fits perfectly in place, so it is certain that no

pieces of it are missing. The edge binding
does not continue into the tongue, and it is
obscure how and where it terminated, as it
crumbled away a little lower than the place
where the tongue broke away, yet there are
no traces of it on the tongue. It must have
ended at some point at its base.
Such a large, fragile tongue of this shape
is quite an unusual feature, but there are
many examples of footwear with similar, but
smaller tongues (Montembault 2000: 164-
169, 172-173, nos 97, 98, 100, 102 and
103).3 However, these are usually lined with
coiled strips of leather, which make them
rigid enough to remain in place. However,
this one is made of thin, flexible leather that
could not have remained on the instep by
itself. It might have been folded back over
the toe; eventually bending the leather may
have weakened it, causing it to break off, but
one cannot be certain. The tongue may have
simply broken off in this place because it was
the narrowest, most vulnerable point. In any
case, the tongue was most probably not held
in place in any way.
SANDALS (Nd.06.945) {Fig. 3]
L. 25 cm, W. max. 8 cm
The pair of sandals is in a very poor state of
preservation. Their entire surface was
covered with a hard, black, bituminous
substance with adhering pebbles and sand
particles. It turned out that this mass is
impossible to remove without causing
damage to the brittle leather. Therefore, the
structural details remained largely
obscured.
Both sandals are fragmentary and broken
into several pieces, but it is clear that their
construction is the same. As one can tell by

3 A close parallel to this tongue is part of the Petrie collection: Petrie Museum no. UC65049 (Oxyrhynchos, Coptic
Period) is a broken-off ornamental tongue, cut out to a repeating spade-like pattern. It is wider than the tongue found
at Naqlun (4.4 cm), but also 10 cm in length.

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