Huge Roman shoe discovered near Hadrian’s Wall

By Adam Dutton

A huge Roman shoe measuring almost 13 inches long has been discovered near Hadrian’s Wall.

The hefty leather sole measures a whopping 12.8in (32.6cm) from toe to heel and is believed to have been worn by a giant Roman soldier.

Archaeologists dug up a total of 32 shoes from a so-called ‘ankle-breaker’ trench at the Magna Roman Fort in Northumberland in May this year.

Eight of the shoes were more than 30cm (11.8in) in length - the equivalent of a UK size 13 or 14.

The discovery of the 2,000-year-old oversized soles has left experts baffled.

Archaeologist Rachel Frame said: "We have to assume it's something to do with the people living here, having bigger feet, being potentially taller, but we don't know.

"Are the people living there from a specific region? Could that be why their shoes are so much larger?

“But at the moment, it's sort of, well, this is unusual."

The large leather shoes were found in a defensive ditch, which the Romans also used as rubbish dumps.

At the nearby Vindolanda settlement, which is seven miles from the Magna Fort, 5,000 shoes have been unearthed since the 1970s.

However, only four or five of the shoes measured more than 30cm, suggesting people were much smaller despite living nearby.

Due to low oxygen conditions in the soil at the sites, the leather shoes were so well preserved the soles were almost completely intact, including the treads.

Several pairs of children's shoes were also found in the same ditch in the Magna Fort, suggesting giant Roman soldiers lived there with their families.

Dr. Elizabeth Greene, Associate Professor at the University of Western Ontario and Vindolanda’s shoe specialist, said: “Even from this small sample uncovered it is clear that these shoes are much larger on average than most of the Vindolanda collection.

“Although we are comparing this new collection which has not yet gone through the conservation process with the Vindolanda shoes that have, even taking into account a maximum shrinkage of up to 1cm/10mm, it still means these shoes are very large indeed.”