Romano-Egyptian striped sock

[Duncan Head]

I missed this one when it appeared in October:
https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2018/oct/04/imaging-tool-unravels-secrets-of-childs-sock-from-ancient-egypt

Original study at https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0204699

I think we all knew that the Romans wore socks with their sandals, but (a) I had vaguely assumed this was a cold-weather thing, so I'm a little surprised to see one in Egypt, and (b) the stripes! Are they sure this is from 300 AD and not 1975?

[Patrick Waterson]

Stripes have been around in Near Eastern clothing since way back. This picture from a tomb-painting in the tomb of Khnumhotep, nomarch of Nekhab (el Kab) shows how popular they were with certain people.

No socks, though, although the women's shoes look vaguely similar in shape if not colour configuration to the Antinoupolis sock.  Continuity or coincidence?  I would assume the latter, although one never knows.

[Erpingham]

Every parent has been there :

"Have you been playing in the rubbish heap again?  And where's your other sock?"

[Patrick Waterson]

"I left it for the future, mummy."

"Don't be silly, Neferpet.  Everyone knows archaeologists are just a myth."

[Swampster]

Doesn't matter whether socks are suitable for the local climate. Every clothing receptacle will spontaneously generate at least one odd sock ex nihilo. The Egyptians would have looked at them, not known what they were, and threw them away. Look at how new that sock looks*. Modern people keep them in the vain hope that another will just turn up. Medieval Italians would wait until another odd sock turned up and wear both of them. That then influenced the wearing of hose of two different colours.
A government sponsored scientific team suggested that these spontaneously arising socks should be gathered and used as fuel in power stations but the report was suppressed by Big Business.

That's what I think anyway.

(*More seriously, just shows that the 'Ancient people couldn't make bright dyes' comments often trotted out on e.g. TMP are not entirely true.)

[Imperial Dave]

my daughter wears odd socks regardless of whether she has the matching ones or not!

[Erpingham]

my daughter wears odd socks regardless of whether she has the matching ones or not!

Tell me about it.  One of those comforting family rituals with my adult daughters is to complain about their odd socks when we meet. 

[Erpingham]

(*More seriously, just shows that the 'Ancient people couldn't make bright dyes' comments often trotted out on e.g. TMP are not entirely true.)

Though we should note that the 70s pop sock illustration is a false colour image and the sock is duller in reality.  The report identifies some pretty complex dyeing activity to get the range of colours though, with most colours double-dyed with varying intensities of the first and second colours.

[Justin Swanton]

Doesn't matter whether socks are suitable for the local climate. Every clothing receptacle will spontaneously generate at least one odd sock ex nihilo. The Egyptians would have looked at them, not known what they were, and threw them away. Look at how new that sock looks*. Modern people keep them in the vain hope that another will just turn up. Medieval Italians would wait until another odd sock turned up and wear both of them. That then influenced the wearing of hose of two different colours.
A government sponsored scientific team suggested that these spontaneously arising socks should be gathered and used as fuel in power stations but the report was suppressed by Big Business.

That's what I think anyway.

(*More seriously, just shows that the 'Ancient people couldn't make bright dyes' comments often trotted out on e.g. TMP are not entirely true.)

[Swampster]

(*More seriously, just shows that the 'Ancient people couldn't make bright dyes' comments often trotted out on e.g. TMP are not entirely true.)

Though we should note that the 70s pop sock illustration is a false colour image and the sock is duller in reality.  The report identifies some pretty complex dyeing activity to get the range of colours though, with most colours double-dyed with varying intensities of the first and second colours.

Fair enough, though even the true colour is pretty good
https://www.britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/collection_object_details.aspx?objectId=155676&partId=1