This skid is so older that when the Great Pyramid was build , it had already been sitting in a cave for 1,000 years . And it ’s so well preserve that you’re able to see a toe - print indoors .
Found in Armenia , this 5,500 year old leather footgear is the oldest such skid in the intact man . Made from a individual piece of cow - hide , the shoe was custom made to jibe its wearer ’s foot . archeologist are n’t sure whether the brake shoe belong to a man or a woman ; it ’s the eq of a modern size 7 cleaning lady ’s , but the low mediocre height of ancient people means such a horseshoe could easily have fit a man .
The cave present a perfect stage set of weather condition to preserve its contents , which besides the shoe also include large containers of wheat , barley , apricots , and various other foodstuffs . The cave ’s climate was dry and nerveless and remarkably unchanging over the millennia , but the secret factor in the preservation was sheep shit : the cave floor was entirely cut through in a thick layer of the manure , which sealed off its content from outside upset .

So thoroughgoing was the saving that the archaeologist originally guessed the horseshoe was only about 600 or 700 old age one-time , and it was only after carbon 14 dating that they discovered they were off by about 5,000 years . The level of detail bear on is simply astonishing : ancient grass was notice inside the horseshoe , which archaeologist speculate was either used as an ancient foot - warmer or as an equivalent weight of the forward-looking shoe horn , pass water it easier for the wearer to slip the shoe on and off . Even its shoelaces are still in nearly pristine precondition .
The skid actually closely resembles that of a eccentric of footwear – the wonderfully named “ pampooties ” – weary on the remote Aran Islands off the westerly seacoast of Ireland until the 1950s , a length of over 2,500 land mile and 5,500 year . That suggests the massive success of this horseshoe design , report a immense , environmentally diverse region across Europe .
The archaeologists still are n’t sure what culture the horseshoe make out from or what the cave was used for , as very picayune is know about this finicky region during that menses of prehistory . The archaeologists desire further excavation of the quietus of the cave – which has already turned up some Robert Ranke Graves – will help oneself them comfortably understand the people who leave this shoe behind .

[ PLoS ONE ]
ArchaeologyScience
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