Location of building where shoes were found…

The shoes were found in this house (1 London Road, Dalkeith) they were found around 20 years ago.

This is the same house around 100 years ago. Not sure how old the house actually is…..

No replies to my email regarding the shoes so far. Hopefully tomorro.

Also not any luck with the museums.

I have another email to send now though, another woman at the nms

Nat

+

Superstition surrounding shoes hidden in walls…

Found some quite interesting information.

One theory is that old shoes hidden in the house walls is a reflection of an ancient superstition that hiding shoes in a house as it was being built, would ward off evil. I was told this may have came from another ancient superstition in which people would ‘build’ dead bodies into the foundation of their houses as they were building it to keep the building upright. Pretty much human sacrifice. Later shoes were used instead of bodies. Its thought that shoes were a replacement because when they are finished with they are well worn and keep the shape of the persons foot and ankle, therefore contained their spirit.

A man at my work told me that the shoes could also have belonged to a child who died. Years ago the parents of a child who died young would often keep the childs shoes in this way. I think this is more likely to be the case with these shoes as in the other instance there was normally either one shoe or one shoe from each member of the family. Apparently, when it was a dead persons shoes, they were nearly always hidden near the ‘weak’ points of houses (doors, windows, chimneys) so the inhabitants would be protected from evil by the shoe owner’s spirit

It is also speculated that it was mostly males that would hide the shoes, it would be kept a secret so that nothing would ruin its effectivness.

Apparently there have been hundereds of shoes found in very old houses when doing renovations, mostly in Europe and eastern parts of the states, but no one has photographed them when in place before removing them.

I’d like to know exactly where they were found.

Nat

+

An extra-ordinary object?

I have (possibly) chosen an ‘extra-ordinary object’.

These boots were found in a little space in the wall of a house that my brother’s boss was working on. He had them in his lock-up for a while until they were having a clear out and my brother thought I would be interested in them.

They are tiny, around 5 inches long. They are very well worn, the soles are worn through at parts.

I don’t know why they had been bricked up in a wall so I will read a little about old superstitions and hopefully that will throw some light on it.

Nat

+

First Project

So I’m not officially started yet but have been given the first brief.

I’ve not had a proper read of it as yet but it sounds pretty interesting… if a little confusing!

Crits with fourth years will probably be great… if a little scary!

Nat

+