[18]
In Rome, Dufour remarks, "Matrons having appropriated the use of
the shoe (_soccus_) prostitutes were not allowed to use it, and
were obliged to have their feet always naked in sandals or
slippers (_crepida_ and _solea_), which they fastened over the
instep with gilt bands. Tibullus delights to describe his
mistress's little foot, compressed by the band that imprisoned
it: _Ansaque compressos colligat arcta pedes_. Nudity of the foot
in woman was a sign of prostitution, and their brilliant
whiteness acted afar as a pimp to attract looks and desires."
(Dufour, _Histoire de la Prostitution_, vol. II., ch. xviii.)
This feeling seems to have survived in a more or less vague and
unconscious form in mediaeval Europe. "In the tenth century,"
according to Dufour (_Histoire de la Prostitution_, vol. VI., p.
11), "shoes _a la poulaine_, with a claw or beak, pursued for
more than four centuries by the anathemas of popes and the
invectives of preachers, were always regarded by mediaeval
casuists as the most abominable emblems of immodesty. At a first
glance it is not easy to see why these shoes--terminating in a
lion's claw, an eagle's beak, the prow of a ship, or other metal
appendage--should be so scandalous.
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