Gentle Craft - Shoe Museum

Dags att dra på vantarna 🥶
Den nordiska vinterkylan är ”ett för alla lefvande varelser mycket fruktansvärdt och skadligt väder”, meddelar Olaus Magnus i sin Historia om de nordiska folken från 1500-talet.

Under årets kallare månader gäller det att klä på sig ordentligt innan man går utanför dörren. Rejäla vinterkläder var ännu viktigare på senmedeltiden, då Sverige var ett par grader kallare än idag.

På bilden syns en handske från 1300-talet ur Medeltidsmuseets samlingar. Handsken är 22 cm lång. Den är grov och skyddade nog även mot att skada händerna vid hårt arbete. Den kanske har burits av en åkare, en dragare eller en vedvräkare, som arbetade med ved och tjära, eller annan någon som arbetade med utomhussysslor? Oavsett vad personen hade för yrke har handsken värmt någon frusen stockholmares händer på medeltiden. Foto: Medeltidsmuseet.

Great finds from Carlisle, including a Fell-I style leather boot!

Some rescue leather on display at Southwark!

Southwark Cathedral is home to London’s first and only permanent Mudlarking exhibition with a display that changes every month, so there’s always something new to look at.

November’s display is ‘Lost Soles’, river-found shoes from medieval to modern, and the Find of the Month is Caroline’s 17th century trade token that tells the story of an early English American settler. Thank you Flora for another wonderfully curated month.

The main mudlarking case lets you get your eye in without getting muddy and features some of the most common things you're most likely to find on the foreshore - pins, coins, pottery shards, roof tiles and buttons.

The display is small but perfectly formed and can be found in the Lancelot's Link close to the main entrance. It’s FREE to visit and no booking is needed.

vol.132 (week 46/23): Ulster Museum Belfast (NIR)

This week in TurnshoeTuesday, we present you the most important archaeological museum in Northern Ireland – the Ulster Museum, formerly known as Belfast Municipal Museum and Arts Gallery. The museum holds at least one medieval shoe and a wooden last in their exhibitions.

The museum
The area of Belfast was settled long in history from the Bronze Age on, but it remained a small village through the Middle Ages. A first Norman castle was probably built around 1200. Belfast only became a town in 1613 and filled with English and other settlers. Today, Belfast is Northern Ireland’s capital with about 350k inhabitants.
Ulster Museum (https://www.ulstermuseum.org/) was founded in 1821 as Belfast Natural History Society; a first exhibition was launched in 1833. The museum, called Belfast Municipal Museum and Arts Gallery, moved over to a new building in 1929. It was renamed to Ulster Museum in 1961 and a Brutalism style extension was opened in 1972. Since 1988, the museum is part of the National Museums and Galleries of Northern Ireland and the largest museum of Northern Ireland. After renewal works in 2006-2009, the museum today presents a mixture of archaeology, zoology, botany, arts and fashion.

Shoes in the museum
Inside their medieval gallery, Ulster Museum holds at least a beautiful shoe and a wooden last and we think they are on display in the permanent collections. The shoe is of the A.T. Lucas type 1, a medieval Irish high-status single-piece shoe – which is comparable to early medieval central and north European slippers made from a single piece of leather, but survives here later in the Gaelic parts of medieval Ireland.
The pictures of the shoes are used under friendly permission by Con Connor, who is the author and shopowner of the homepage www.celticshoes.ie and an experienced and skilled shoemaker and will be added to our Facebook shoe gallery soon. Also check out his Facebook blog here: https://www.facebook.com/CelticShoes.

Digital offers and further research
More details about the shoes can be found on the page of Celtic shoes here: https://www.celticshoes.ie/aboutcelticshoes.html. In particular, the shoes can be admired here: https://www.celticshoes.ie/uploads/2/0/0/7/20074727/2_orig.jpg and the last here https://www.celticshoes.ie/uploads/2/0/0/7/20074727/7_orig.jpg on the page of Celtic Shoes. Also check out the essay about medieval gaelic shoes here: https://www.celticshoes.ie/inthefootstepsofthenoblegael.html.
A nice tour of the museum can be found here on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w0JDjnJsSCY.
The museum offers a pretty deprecated digital tour here: https://www.virtualvisittours.com/ulster-museum/.
The picture of the museum is used under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license by user Bazonka from https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ulster_Museum_3.JPG .
Beyond the listed links, some of the information about Belfast’s and the museum's history is cited from the corresponding Wikipedia sites.

Literature
Anthony T Lucas: Footwear in Ireland. Journal of the County Louth Archaeological Society 13.4. 1956
Con Connor: In the footsteps of the noble Gael. In: Joseph Mannion, Katharine Simms (eds): Politics, Kinship and Culture in Gaelic Ireland, c.1100-c.1690. Wordwell. 2018.

Last updated: 14.11.2023
Hint: The complete TurnshoeTuesday map can be found here:
https://www.google.com/maps/d/edit?mid=1M-CQxxbfVfh7GtlSsNhZa5MTteiI2Dbb&usp=sharing

🌟 1 week to go until Worcestershire Archaeology Day! 🌟

Talk spotlight: The Art of Archaeological Conservation

Focusing on objects found in 2023, hear all about process of archaeological conservation from excavation to exhibition.

Pieta is a freelance object conservator for Drakon Heritage and Conservation. She is an accredited member of the Institute of Conservation and has worked on many amazing archaeological finds including the Staffordshire Hoard.

Remember to book your ticket to hear this fascinating talk and 7 more on Saturday 18th November at The Hive: bit.ly/WorcsArchDay23

vol.131 (week 45/23): Burgmuseum Grünwald (D)

Back in Bavaria, we present you a remote department of the Archäologische Staatssammlung München (see TurnshoeTuesday vol. 121) this week. Burg Grünwald (known from Karl Valentin’s famous classic “Ja so warn’s, die alten Rittersleut”) in the south of Munich is home to a museum dedicated to medieval archaeology. Here we find two examples of shoe soles from Bayreuth (the real shoes can be seen in TunshoeTuesday vol. 1 😉) and some nicely done reconstructed turnshoes and pattens.

The museum
Grünwald is a community at Isar river right to the south of Munich. The area was settled already back in Bronze Age and was home to a Roman settlement in the 3th and 4th centuries AD. A small medieval village can be found here in the 11th century which belonged to the Derbolfinger dynasty, ministerals of the counts of Andechs.
A high medieval castle in Grünwald can be tracked back to the 12th century. In 1272, village and castle was taken over by the Wittelsbach dynasty who owned it until the 19th century and used it as a residence and retreat from Munich in the late middle ages. The castle was extended in 1486/87 which defines today’s exterior look. The Grünwald conference in 1522 marked the beginning of counter-reformation in the Holy Roman Empire. Grünwald lost its position end of the 17th century, when modern palaces became more fancy. Used as a hunting lodge, arsenal and even jail, the castle declined and was sold to privateers in 1879. In a very bad condition, the castle was bought by investors in 1970 who planned to destroy large parts of the castle. This was impeded by a citizens’ initiative.
In the following, Grünwald castle was acquired by the State of Bavaria in 1976 with the goal to install a museum here, which started with a small exhibition in the renovated tower in 1979 and finally the complete museum was opened in 1982 as Burgmuseum Grünwald (http://www.archaeologie-bayern.de/en/zweigmuseen/gruenwald/), which is a department of Archäologische Staatssammlung München (see TurnshoeTuesday vol. 121).
In 2013 and 2014, the museum was intensely renovated and the exhibition remodeled, creating today’s setup with castle Grünwald’s history including Karl Valentin and other local VIPs and an exhibition about castles in Bavaria. The museum features a surprisingly large collection of medieval finds – so if you are around, don’t miss it.

Shoes in the museum
At Grünwald, among many other finds we find a pair of shoe soles from the Bayreuth excavations (see TurnshoeTuesday vol.1 https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=2355568074589039&set=a.2355509474594899). These soles are dated to the 14th century and show a clearly pointy shape.
In addition, there are a couple of arrangements of reproduced medieval clothes and shoes on display, which includes a beautifully decorated pair of high medieval shoes and some late medieval low shoes on a pair of reproduced wooden pattens.

Digital offers and further research
A nice overview of the museum can be found here on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1WtAVzNFbKo, although the movie maker seems to have missed the soles.
The picture of the museum is used under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license by user Rufus46 from https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Burg_Gruenwald_Eingangstor.jpg.
Beyond the listed links, some of the information about Grünwald’s and the museum's history is cited from the corresponding Wikipedia sites.

Literature
Andrea Bischof: Ein spätmittelalterlicher Brunnen aus Bayreuth: Ergebnisse einer archäologischen Ausgrabung an der ehemaligen Schmiedgasse nahe der Stadtmauer (Arbeiten zur Archäologie Süddeutschlands). Faustus. 2010. ISBN-13: 978-3933474605

Last updated: 07.11.2023
Hint: The complete TurnshoeTuesday map can be found here:
https://www.google.com/maps/d/edit?mid=1M-CQxxbfVfh7GtlSsNhZa5MTteiI2Dbb&usp=sharing

vol.130 (week 44/23): Horsens Museum (DK)

This week in TurnshoeTuesday, we present to you a brand-new remodeled archaeological department – at Horsens Museum, it was installed end of 2022. This museum has a couple of medieval shoes in the collection – unfortunately we are not sure whether the shoes are on display in the small permanent exhibition, but remember that we also include such museums in our list and are always glad about hints from our readers. Links to the shoes held by Horsens museum can be found in our article below.

The museum
The town of Horsens emerged in the Viking era; earliest traces date back to the 10th century. Market and town rights were given to Horsens likely in the 13th century. Most of the old town’s layout was created in the 14th century, when Horsens was expanded to become a fortification and a royal Danish castle was built here. Today, Horsens counts about 60k inhabitants and is host to one of the largest European renaissance fairs.
Horsens Museum (https://museumhorsens.dk/HorsensMuseum) goes back to local association founded in 1906, which first displayed their collections in the Technical School. In 1915, a dedicated museum was built and opened. Until 1984, the museum focused both on arts and cultural history; today it holds more than 25k archaeological objects and is involved in local excavations as well as in expeditions for Bering’s burial site in the far East. The archaeological presentation was renewed in 2022.

Shoes in the museum
Horsens is home to a couple of late medieval shoe finds that come from excavations at Søndergade 35 made in 2009. Most of these shoes are kept in their pieces, but one prepared to be presented in an exhibition which makes us think you possibly can visit them there, but we are not sure.

Digital offers and further research
The shoe finds from Horsens including pictures by Horsens Museum can be found here in the kulturarv.dk data base:
https://www.kulturarv.dk/mussam/VisGenstand.action?genstandId=5881598
https://www.kulturarv.dk/mussam/VisGenstand.action?genstandId=5881601
https://www.kulturarv.dk/mussam/VisGenstand.action?genstandId=5881596
https://www.kulturarv.dk/mussam/VisGenstand.action?genstandId=5881599
https://www.kulturarv.dk/mussam/VisGenstand.action?genstandId=5881597
Some impressions from Horsens Museum can be found here in this Youtube video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v3JsqjFC8tg.
Beyond the listed links, some of the information about Horsens’ and the museum's history is cited from the corresponding Wikipedia sites.

Literature
Frederik Callesen: HOM2095 etape 1, Søndergade 35, Horsens. Arkæologisk udgravning Beretning. Sted-SBnr.: 16.03.03-128. Horsens Museum. 2009

Last updated: 31.10.2023
Hint: The complete TurnshoeTuesday map can be found here:
https://www.google.com/maps/d/edit?mid=1M-CQxxbfVfh7GtlSsNhZa5MTteiI2Dbb&usp=sharing

Bij archeologisch onderzoek in de bouwput van de Markthal zijn in 2009-2010 veel vondsten gedaan, zoals deze twee schoenen. Het zijn twee leren kinderschoentjes die samen een paar vormen. Ze werden gevonden in een houten tonput. Schoenen worden regelmatig bij opgravingen gevonden, maar een paar is wel bijzonder. De schoenen dateren uit de periode 1500-1550 en zijn 17cm lang.

What an interesting idea!

Today's is our collection of Roman shoes!
These shoes were made of leather and were tanned using tree bark to make them stronger for Roman soldiers. The different sizes of shoes shows that troops brought their families with them when they were overseas.

Besoin d'aide pour pister les musées dans la nuit ?

Si vous ne voulez pas y aller au pif, 19 parcours thématiques sont concoctés spécialement pour vous !

Des itinéraires entre les différents musées pour vivre l’événement sous un angle incongru : en musique, à pied ou à vélo, si vous avez les crocs ou en compagnie de toutes petites pattes. Notre partenaire Nestlé vous a concocté un parcours "Good food, good life" pour profiter de toutes les bonnes choses de la Ndm.

Pour les indécis : un rapide quiz en ligne permet à chacune et chacun de sentir le parcours correspondant au mieux à son minois. Toutes les informations sur www.lanuitdesmusees.ch/parcours

Ça se lèche les babines ? Vous avez les crocs ?
Tout ce qu'il vous faut aux Villages de la Nuit des musées !

À la Riponne, stand d’information, d’accréditation et food trucks vous attendent !

À Plateforme 10, des guides de la Nuit seront également là pour vous renseigner !

A spotlight on: The Haunch of Venison

Our collection includes some weird and wonderful items from the Haunch of Venison.

This 17th century shoe was found hidden behind panelling alongside another single shoe from a different pair. Shoes were often concealed in buildings close to windows and doorways as charms to protect inhabitants from witches, ghosts or the devil. Found with the shoes were a rat trap and a stoneware bottle. The presence of multiple items suggests the cache was deliberately placed.

Find out more about the history and secrets of arguably Salisbury's most famous pub from author and local historian Ruby Vitorino in her upcoming online talk on 19th October.

Ruby's book 'The Haunch of Venison, Salisbury: an A-Z History' is available to buy in the museum shop. We highly recommend it!

🎟 Tickets available here: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/the-haunch-of-venison-online-talk-by-ruby-vitorino-moody-tickets-703251533267?aff=oddtdtcreator

Needle case- nearly complete!

Ett medeltida nålhus | SHM Statens historiska museer

Reconstructions of late medieval shoemaker's tools in the Gentle Craft Shoe Museum collection.

The collection of reconstructed Roman tools at the Gentle Craft Shoe Museum Lausanne. (Iron tools by J.-M. Corona, Iron Museum Vallorbe CH)

It's time for "My Favourite Artefact"!

“My favourite artefact is this royal archer’s wrist guard, which features the emblem of a pomegranate, a symbol associated with Katherine of Aragon.

When the Mary Rose sank in 1545, Henry VIII and Katherine of Aragon were long divorced, so why was an archer wearing this outdated wrist guard? Was it inherited? Was he a supporter of Katherine? Or is it simply recycling?

I find it so fascinating how just one small item causes us to ponder who wore it and what it meant to them.”

Josephine Payter-Harris, Head of Programming and Visitor Engagement at the Mary Rose

Let us know your favourite object that was recovered from the Mary Rose!

Its in the bag! Pleated money bag inspired by a find from Bankside London dated 1575-1600(A. Nailor 2005, 60-61, Fig. 48, no. 265, In G Egan (ed), Material culture in London in an age of transition: Tudor and Stuart period finds c 1450-c 1700 from excavations at riverside sites in Southwark. MoLAS Monograph 19, Museum of London Archaeology Service, London, 58-61)

vol.120 (week 34/23): Muzeum Acheologiczne w Gdańsku (PL)

This edition in TurnshoeTuesday marks one of the outstanding highlights in our modest collection so far. The city of Gdańsk is home to many shoe finds which have been worked on in preparation of a special exhibition at the Muzeum Acheologiczne w Gdańsku in 2016 and have been travelling around Poland ever since. The selected objects for the presentations are of high quality and give a good overview of late medieval shoemaking crafts. Although the wandering exhibition is currently not on display at Gdańsk, still the permanent medieval exhibition brings many interesting objects including shoes to display.

The museum
The city of Gdańsk is the capital of Pomerania in today's northern Poland. The town traces back to a Viking trade route in the region back in the 9th century, which is shown by Arabian coins found here. A real settlement with a harbor in the old town is known for the late 9th century. In the late 10th century, the town was part of the realm of Polish ruler Mieszko I and first mentioned when Adalbert of Prague tried to christianize the town (and found already Christians here). In the 11th century Pomerania separated from Poland from time to time; finally in the early 12th century, a governor was installed at Gdańsk. A first settlement of German traders e.g. from Lübeck was installeed in the late 12th century. In the 1210s and 1220s, Gdańsk was conquered by Danish troups, became part of an independent Pomerania again and even was conquered by Brandenburg troups in the 1270s and became Polish again. In the early 14th century, the town was taken over by the Teutonic Order. The main part of the town was part of the Hanse in the Baltic Sea and had a city council following Kulm city charters since 1343; the town prospered in the 14th century. After the Battle of Tannenberg in 1410, the towns of the region became unsatisfied with the Order and the Prussian Union was founded in 1440 which separated from the Order in the Thirteen Years' War after 1454 and Gdańsk became Polish again. Today, Gdańsk has about 470k inhabitants.
Muzeum Acheologiczne w Gdańsku (https://archeologia.pl/) was opened as a department of the Pomeranian Museum of Gdańsk in 1958 and became an independent archaeological museum in 1962. The museum features finds from Pomerania and Gdańsk from prehistory to presence and is also reponsible for many excavations in Gdańsk since the 1980s. The main building is located in the former 16th century merchant's house (which used to house the Natural Society from 1846 on) and used to house a permanent exhibition about Gdansk's early history which included shoes, too. This large part of the museum is currently closed and the exhibition will be changed. In 2008, after large renovation works, a new department was opened in a former granary called the „blue lamb“ (built in the 16th - 18th century) which focusses on the medieval history in Gdańsk. There are more interesting departments of the museum, including an open-air museum in Sopot featuring reconstructed early medieval houses.

Shoes in the museum
Besides the special exhibition discussed below, the museum puts a ccouple of medieval shoes on display in the permanent exhibition at the „Blue lamb“ house as can be seen in the virtual Google Maps tour linked below; see the last row in our overview picture, left images.
In 2016, there was a large exhibition at the museum under the name „Każdy krok zostawia ślad“ („Every step leaves a trace“) including 70 shoes from Gdańsk excavations. As all the shoes in this exhibition actually belong to the museum, we discuss this display back then in detail here.
In the following, the special exhibition became a traveling exhibition including stations at Poznań 2017, Wroclaw in 2017-18, Radom 2018, Krakow 2018, Piotrkow Trybunalski 2018, Bytom 2018-19, Starogard Gdański 2019, Zamosc 2019, Biskupin 2020, Węgorzewo 2020-21, Torun 2021-22, Gołdap 2022, Kętrzyn 2022, Chojnice 2023 and we are pretty sure we did not find all mentions on the web. This is an impressive list and we do not know of any other wandering shoe exhibition of this dimension!
The shoes found at Gdańsk cover 30 years of archaeology and cover mostly the 13th til 17th century. Here in TurnshoeTuesday, we focus on the finds of the 13th thru 15th centuries.
The special exhibition covered basically all aspects of footwear, including complete shoes of the 12th century (first row, first and second images), 14th-15th century (first row, third to last images; second row, first to fifth images), 15th century (second row, sixth and seventh images; third row, first to third images), 15th-16th century (third row, fourth to last images). Furthermore, the exhibition included uppers, decorated ones of the 12th century (fourth row, first and second images), high and low shoes of the 14th century (fourth row, third and fourth images), a decorated poulaine of the 14th - 15th century (fourth row, fifth image) and a decorated vamp of the 14th - 16th century (fourth row, sixth image) as well as a high shoe of the 15th century (fourth row, last image).
A sole of the 14th - 15th century was also on display (fifth row, first image) as well as parts of leather pattens including a decorated sole of the 15th century (fifth row, second image) and the vamp of a leather patten of the 15th century (fifth row, third image). Wooden pattens are represented by fragments of the 14th - 15th century (fifth row, fourth, fifth and last images) and of the late 15th century (fifth row, sixth image).
Curiosities are late 15th century miniatures of pattens (sixth row, first image), bone skates of the 14th - 16th century (sixth row, second image), ice crampons of the 12th - 13th century (sixth row, third image), a sole with an iron clamp on it of 14th - 15th century (sixth row, fourth image), a sole with two iron patches (sixth row, fifth image). Lastly, but also very interesting, there are tools on display including a 15th century last (sixth row, last image) and many other tools including knifes and needles from the 15th thru 18th century (seventh row, last image).
The pictures have been friendly provided under courtesy of Muzeum Archeologiczne w Gdańsku.
The shoes in the special exhibition can be found here in our Facebook shoe gallery, starting with this picture https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=985127921633068&set=a.974606682685192 .

Digital offers and further research
The department museum of the Gdansk museum in the „Blue lamb“ house can be visited virtually here: https://goo.gl/maps/Q7hPJ7LsjDkQSxUP9 for the display scene of medieval market life (check it out!) and here: https://goo.gl/maps/dt1XP8df8y8ENmGDA for the permanent exhibition of medieval finds from Gdańsk.
The museum offers an online database here https://archeoportal.pl/zabytki where you can search for „but“ (shoe) and will find some of the medieval shoes directly or you select the collection „Każdy krok zostawia ślad” Obuwie historyczne ze zbiorów Muzeum Archeologicznego w Gdańsku from the corresponding dropdown list and you will get all 131 results, of which not all are shoes of course, but fabulous 70 are!
The whole catalogue of the special exhibitn is online for free and available here:https://l.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Farcheologia.pl%2F!pliki%2Fpublikacje_elektroniczne%2FKazdy-krok-katalog.pdf
On their Youtube channel, the museum offers a lot of interesting information about the museum itself and also about shoes, like this time-lapse movie of the reconstruction of a shoe here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9zD9CZiZ4_o .
On their homepage, the museum features „objects of the month“. For October 2021 we find a 14th/15th century high shoe here: https://archeologia.pl/zabytek-miesiaca/zabytek-miesiaca-archiwum-2021/bucik-z-ulicy-szerokiej-w-gdansku-zabytek-miesiaca-mag-pazdziernik-2021/
The picture of the museum is used under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license by user Yanek / fotopolska.eu from https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Gda%C5%84sk,_Wyspa_Spichrz%C3%B3w_-_fotopolska.eu_(286975).jpg.
Beyond the listed links, some of the information about Gdańsk's and the museum's history is cited from the corresponding Wikipedia sites.

Literature
Beata Ceynowa, Ewa Trawicka (eds.): „Każdy krok zostawia ślad". Obuwie historyczne ze zbiorów Muzeum Archeologicznego w Gdańsku, Katalog / ‘Every step leaves a trace’ Historic footwear from the collection of archaeological museum in Gdańsk. Catalogue (ed. B. Ceynowa, E. Trawicka). Muzeum Archeologiczne w Gdańsku. Gdańsk: 2016

Last updated: 22.08.2023
Hint: The complete TurnshoeTuesday map can be found here:
https://www.google.com/maps/d/edit?mid=1M-CQxxbfVfh7GtlSsNhZa5MTteiI2Dbb&usp=sharing

Skolstart!
Vid kyrkomötet i Skänninge 1248 beslutades det att man vid varje domkyrka skulle inrätta en skola för utbildning av blivande präster. Pojkar skulle redan i sjuårsåldern kunna tas emot och erbjudas mat och husrum samt en utbildning på 8–10 år.

Här i Stockholm omnämns stadens skola för första gången i skrift år 1315, men då som en verksamhet som redan var igång.

Under medeltiden gick de flesta barn inte alls i skolan utan undervisades i hemmet. Här fick man lära sig allt man behövde för att sköta hemmet om man var flicka, och hur man skötte gårdens sysslor som pojke. I Stockholm lärde sig barnen sina föräldrars yrke och även flickorna behövde en del kunskaper i detta då de var en aktiv del i verksamheten.

På bilden syns en medeltida barnstövel som finns utställd på Medeltidsmuseet. Här kan du lära dig om barns villkor på medeltiden. Fri entré. Välkommen!

Bild: Snörstövel för barn, daterad 1300–1400-talet, fynd från den stora arkeologiska utgrävningen på Helgeandsholmen, Riksgropen, 1978-1980. Foto: Medeltidsmuseet.

vol.119 (week 33/23): Badisches Landesmuseum Karlsruhe (D)

Back in Germany, we visit yet another big museum in the southwest, the Landesmuseum in Karlsruhe. This museum has a big medieval-themed section with a strong focus on arts history and sacral art. Yet, there is also a handful of archaeological finds on display – including some shoe from Freiburg.

The museum
Karlsruhe is actually a modern foundation, but incorporated several settlements that traced back longer. Naturally, the region was already settled back in the Bronze Age and there are also Roman traces around. In the Middle Ages, there were several settlements on today's town area, including the town of Durlach which advanced to be the residence of the counts of Baden-Durlach. After several devastations in the 17th century including the 30 years' war, Margrave Karl Wilhelm decided to have a new town built at today's position as a planned city including a big residence in 1715. Today, Karlsruhe counts about 300k inhabitants and is Baden-Württemberg's third largest city.
Karlsruhe's palace was built starting right away in 1715 as the residence for the Margraves and Grand Dukes of Baden until 1918. After the resignation of the Grand Duke of Baden in 1918, the palace was taken over by the State of Baden-Württemberg and a State Museum (Badisches Landesmuseum, https://www.landesmuseum.de/museum) was founded in 1919 under fusion with the older antiquities collection installed at Friedrichsplatz back in 1873. The museum was opened to the public in 1921. Although the palace was severely damaged in WWII, the collections could be saved and after renovation works the museum could be reopened in 1959.
The museum contains many different departments, including a large antiquities collection, Turkish b***y of 1691, a modern presentation about archaeology from prehistory to early Middle Ages, historical collections from Middle Ages via Modern Age to contemporary. Furthermore the museum is host to large special exhibitions regularly.
The exhibition about the Middle Ages seemed to have seen better years when we were there back in 2008 – and so it is no wonder that the museum will be closed down for renovation in 2027. Let's hope for an up-to-date presentation after that!

Shoes in the museum
Inside the department on the Middle Ages, there is a presentation about fashion and shoes. During our visit back in 2008 we found here one medieval (left) shoe from the Freiburg finds, which is dated to the second half of the 15th century and adressed as a slip-on shoe. The shoe (upper picture) shows traces of cobblery – there is a horizontal opening at the heel part, presumably used to attach a lace for fixation of this heel part.
Furthermore, there is a child's shoe on display without further knowing of the origins (lower picture). The shoe is adressed as an early 16th century slip-on shoe, which is not the case. This is clearly a knotted high shoe which is likely to be from the 14th or 15th century. Due to the bad quality of the labeling back in 2008 we are even not completely sure whether we mixed up both shoes (basically we have oriented us at the „left shoe“ statement).
The shoes in the museum can be found here in our Facebook shoe gallery, starting with this picture https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=978263148986212&set=a.974606682685192 .

Digital offers and further research
This travel report here proves that shoes were still on display in 2019 and that obviously the explanations there are not up to date, transporting overcome clichés: https://www.swv-em.de/neue-seite.html .
The museum offers some nice digital tools here, but we have not found any medieval shoes here (but modern one though!): https://katalog.landesmuseum.de/ .
Some impressions from the Middle Ages section of the museum can be found here: https://www.landesmuseum.de/museum-im-schloss/mittelalter .
The picture of the museum is used under the Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication by user AnRo0002 from https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:20130605Schloss_Karlsruhe05.jpg.
Beyond the listed links, some of the information about Karlsruhe's and the museum's history is cited from the corresponding Wikipedia sites.

Literature
Ilse Fingerlin: Der Lederabfall, in Matthias Untermann (Hrsg.): Die Latrine des Augustinereremiten-Klosters in Freiburg im Breisgau. Landesdenkmalamt Baden-Württemberg. Theiss: 1995

Last updated: 15.08.2023
Hint: The complete TurnshoeTuesday map can be found here:
https://www.google.com/maps/d/edit?mid=1M-CQxxbfVfh7GtlSsNhZa5MTteiI2Dbb&usp=sharing