It is
not rare to find Chinese Christians accusing themselves at
confession of having had 'evil thoughts on looking at a woman's
foot.'" (Dr. J. Matignon, "A propos d'un Pied de Chinoise,"
_Archives d'Anthropologie Criminelle_, 1898.)
It is said that a Chinese Empress, noted for her vice and having
a congenital club foot, about the year 1100 B.C., desired all
women to resemble her, and that the practice of compressing the
foot thus arose. But this is only tradition, since, in 300 B.C.,
Chinese books were destroyed (Morache, Art. "Chine,"
_Dictionnaire Encyclopedique des Sciences Medicales_, p. 191). It
is also said that the practice owes its origin to the wish to
keep women indoors. But women are not secluded in China, nor does
foot compression usually render a woman unable to walk. Many
intelligent Chinese are of opinion that its object is to promote
the development of the sexual parts and of the thighs, and so to
aid both intercourse and parturition. There is no ground for
believing that it has any such influence, though Morache found
that the mons veneris and labia are largely developed in Chinese
women, and not in Tartar women living in Pekin (who do not
compress the foot).
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