Ancient Ghillies

[Calgacus]

Thank you all for the information!



Where is the picture of a shoe which has been called brogue here?

In fairness to Benning Boy, you referred to the footwear in your post as 'ghillies'. The assumption was that you were referring to ghillie brogues.

These are ancient ghillies:-

[Mairsial MacÙr'ille]

they are very comfortable , i have a pair that i wear during the summer when out hiking or going to Renaissance faires or the like.

that's what I mean

[OC Richard]

The ancient Gaelic footwear survives in the Aran Islands, the pamputai



Something similar is documented in the Highlands, in a letter written by John Elder to King Henry VIII in 1542:

"in wyntir, whene the froest is mooste vehement which we can not suffir bair footide... after we have slayne red deir, we flaye of the skyne... and settinge of our bair foote on the inside therof... we play the sutters; compasinge and mesuringe so moche therof, as shall retche up to our ancklers, pryckynge the upper part therof also with holis, that the water may repas wher it entris, and stretchide up with a stronge thwange of the same, meitand above our saide ancklers, so me make our schoois; Therfor, we usinge suche maner of schoois, the roghe hairie syde outwart... we be callit roughefootide Scottis; which maner of schoois... in Latyne be callid perones..."

Oddly, at one Highland Games I attended there was a woman who had a booth selling footwear identical to the Aran Island pampooties (as the name is Anglicised) but when I talked to her I discovered that she had never heard of pampooties. Strange that she would independently come up with the exact thing. I don't remember what she called the shoes she made.

There's a guy who has a booth at our local Renaissance Faires who makes a variety of semi-authentic shoes and he makes a semi-ghillies style which looks very nice, are quite popular around here, and which people tell me are very comfortable.

[Mairsial MacÙr'ille]

Ok, pampooties, I'm going to read a little bit more about them.

[Benning Boy]

Here's a place to start reading about older foot wear:

http://www.personal.utulsa.edu/~marc...e/SHOEHOM5.HTM

Is a very old site, as internet things go, and hasn't been updated in almost 10 years. I find it hard to navigate. There's more there than you will find at the link, it just seems hard to navigate.

There were other sites that have come and gone that had good info.


There are references to Scots wearing turnshoes, the American equivalent might be the hard soled moccasin of the western Indians, although turnshoes cannot be called traditional Highland footwear, as all of Europe was wearing such shoes. My thought is the Scots were not an isolated people, and probably were exposed to many shoe types from very early on. Personally, I think the pampootie, being the simples and crudest was probably the earliest, with the pucker toe moccasin type shoe, or bog shoe, being right up there with it as a minimalist design. They are only incrementally different.

[Mairsial MacÙr'ille]

Thanks! old but interesting website. Are Pampooties and Cuaran the same?

[Benning Boy]

The two shoes are similar. The curuan is more developed. It's quite a bit like an American Indian pucker toe moccasin. this pdf shows how to make a curuan:

http://www.carillion.eastkingdom.org/CUARAN_convt.pdf

The evolution of curuan can be seen here:

http://www.mcginleyclan.org/nativeclothing.htm

Here's an X Marks discussion of them:

http://www.xmarksthescot.com/forum/f...g-shoes-80838/

More information here:

http://www.appins.org/pampooties.htm

You might look up the Tarim Basin mummies, of the desert region of western China, they were very Celtic-like peoples, fair haired, wove simple tartan and so on. Their footwear could be said to be traditional Celtic footwear, maybe. (These "Celts" may very well have introduced into China a few things that are now considered traditional Chinese.)

The attached photo shoes something like the ghillie shoe or Iron Age shoe, which appears to have holes cut as some describe to let the water out. It's from a site that no longer exists, but can be found on the Internet Wayback Machine here:

http://web.archive.org/web/200610131...h_art&iart=415.

From singing opera, I've learned to pronounce Italian, but can't actually read it. So a translation is up to you.

I can't find my copy of this book right now, but illustrated are some moccasins very similar to the Celtic shoes under discussion.

http://www.amazon.com/Craft-Manual-A.../dp/1884693008

It contains info about measurments and such that might be useful to anyone attempting Celtic shoes.

[Mairsial MacÙr'ille]

Wow thank you again! that's a lot of interesting information, I really appreciate it!

[Stan]

I made a pair of these ancient style shoes to wear at a Ren fair. They are soft, light and extremely comfortable. They are good driving shoes and Motor homing shoes, but (to me) they are just a bit to costume like for anything but the most casual of events and out in the woods,....where I live.....

[Mairsial MacÙr'ille]

I made a pair of these ancient style shoes.

Great job!