Sometime during the Middle Ages, an unfortunate individual lost their Shoe. Archaeologists unearthed the battered remains of a piece of footwear in an ancient street located underneath a construction site in Freiberg, Germany.
The city of Freiberg is undergoing a construction project in one of its oldest parts of town. Rusted pipes and cables are being replaced while archaeologists conduct excavations in the area.
They found that the top layer of the shoe was made of leather, and it is thought to date back to the fourteenth century. Fragments of ceramic were also found in the area, which helped researchers determine how old the shoe was.
Christoph Heiermann, department leader at the Saxon State Office for Archaeology in Dresden, stated that someone may have tossed the shoe out after it had been worn beyond repair.
Thanks to the lack of oxygen and the extremely moist soil under which it was buried, the shoe has managed to stay largely intact over the centuries.
Heirermann speculates that the dampness of the soil is likely due to an ancient body of water that no longer exists. He also notes that the preservation of leather is a rather rare phenomenon.
About five feet below the surface of the ground, archaeologists came across evidence of a body of water, confirming Heirermann’s theory. They found wooden water pipes from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.
The shoe, along with the ceramic fragments, have now been brought to a restoration laboratory, where scientists are keeping them submerged in water to prevent them from drying out and deteriorating any further. According to Heiermann, if the artifacts don’t stay moist, they would crumble to dust in just the span of a few weeks.
Aside from the ancient footwear, researchers have uncovered a number of other interesting finds during their excavations. Among them were two unpaved roads that dated back to the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, as well as a pit in front of one of the oldest buildings in Freiburg.
Sign up for Chip Chick’s newsletter and get stories like this delivered to your inbox.
The pit contained broken tableware and rubble left over from a fire that occurred somewhere between the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries.
As road construction in Freiburg begins, archaeologists hope that more structures and artifacts will be revealed.
If true crime defines your free time, this is for you: join Chip Chick’s True Crime Tribe
Legend Has It That She Haunts The Golden Gate Park, And You Shouldn’t Be Anywhere Near Stow Lake At Night
She Walked Out Of A First Date After A Guy Berated Her For Not Wanting To Have Kids
She Got Up And Left Her Own Wedding In Tears After Her Parents Humiliated Her During Their Speech
She’s Worried That Her Preschooler Son Is Showing Psychopathic Signs
In 1977, She Left Her New Job At A Law Firm To Run Some Errands During Her Lunch Break And Was Never Seen Or Heard From Again
Want To Deer-Proof Your Garden? Here Are 10 Shrubs That Deer Won’t Dine On
She Wrote The Beloved Childhood Story “The Tale Of Peter Rabbit,” And Worldwide, Over 250 Million Copies Of This Classic Have Been Sold
