Can Bricks Tell Us the Year? Hobnail Prints on Tegular Material from the Mithraeum III at Apulum as Evidence of Footwear Fashion

Abstract

Among the carefully collected finds during the excavations that took place at the Mithraeum III (2008, 2013–1026) in Apulum, Roman Dacia, were two bricks with hobnail prints of nailed footwear. One of the finds, in particular, showed the complete form of the sole, decorated with an elaborate hobnail pattern. A closer look at the published finds revealed that similar or even identical designs decorated shoes that have been discovered at a considerable distance on different sites in the North-Western provinces of the empire. Large sets of leather shoes found in humid environments of these provinces have shown that shoe soles were, equally to footwear upper parts, a fashionable object, having a chronological and social value in archaeology. In the context of limited interest given to hobnail prints in the publications about Roman Dacia, this paper argues for the revalorization of the subject in the archaeological literature.