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They had big feet?
First we need to spend 100k on researcher and publish at least 20 articles.
But yes, big feet.
Publish or perish, amirite?
Biggus Dickus’ shoes.
He had a wife…
Incontinentia… Incontinentia Buttocks
That shoe’s sole was 12.6 inches long, which is roughly the same size as a men’s 14 in the United States, reports Live Science’s Kristina Killgrove.
That is smaller than my shoe size, those scientists have a dumb frame of reference.
Not my fault everyone else has weird and tiny feet.
Considering 6’ people were rare 150 years ago, I’d imagine a size 14 would have been crazy 2,000 years ago.
Kind of rare, but not exactly unheard of. Kinda like anyone taller than 6’ 8" these days. If you saw them, you might think “Wow, they’re tall” but you wouldnt think of them as freakish.
Combine that with this being a Roman fort, and the fact that being a soldier was probably a pretty common job for big/strong men, and it’s really not that surprising. Kind of a nothing story really. Imagine a bunch of future archeologists scratching their heads over finding a bunch of large shoes in an NBA locker room.
They were also shorter on average than modern humans. https://history.stackexchange.com/questions/17072/what-was-the-average-height-of-roman-men-and-women
They also lived shorter on average. Some of them still reached a very old age. The average really doesn‘t tell us that much about the extremes that existed.
That’s because of high infant/childhood mortality rates skewing the average. If you take away anyone who died before age 5, the average age shoots up to like 70+ in most places. Not too different from today.
Yes, I know. The problem is that most people see an average stat and think it‘s a universal law. That goes for life expectancy, height and even GDP per capita among other things. In reality no one is perfectly average and extremes exist everywhere.
Since May, archaeologists working at Magna have unearthed eight massive leather shoes that each measure more than 11.8 inches long.
So four pairs? Was there one gigantic dude there that kept losing his shoes?
Spoiler alert: it was the main clown college in the Roman empire.
But seriously, that’s interesting.
And I’m still wondering why they are still wondering. So they are digging out oversized Caligae. You know that Caligae are? They are sandals. And they are digging them up at a fort at Hadrians Wall. Up in Scotland. Where things get cold occasionally.
Now imagine soldiers, standing guard or patrolling in the cold, wearing sandals. What would they do? They’d wrap up their feet in something warm, like lamb furs. Or cloth. But wadded up feet don’t fit into standard-sized sandals designed for bare feet. Solution, rather obvious, is having oversized sandals that fit feet and insulation.
And I’m still wondering why they are still wondering. So they are digging out oversized Caligae. You know that Caligae are? They are sandals. And they are digging them up at a fort at Hadrians Wall. Up in Scotland. Where things get cold occasionally.
Now imagine soldiers, standing guard or patrolling in the cold, wearing sandals. What would they do? They’d wrap up their feet in something warm, like lamb furs. Or cloth. But wadded up feet don’t fit into standard-sized sandals designed for bare feet. Solution, rather obvious, is having oversized sandals that fit feet and insulation.
Time-travellling clowns.
