These pattens in the old trunk are prettier than most pattens which have been preserved. In general, they are rather shabby things. I have another pair—more commonplace, which chance to exist; they were not saved purposely. They are pictured [here].
English Clogs.
There is a most ungallant old riddle, “Why is a wife like a patten?” The answer reads, “Because both are clogs.” A very courteous bishop was once asked this uncivil query, and he answered without a moment’s hesitation, “Because both elevate the soul (sole).” Pattens may be clogs, yet there is a difference. After much consultation of various authorities, and much discussion in the columns of various querying journals, I make this decision and definition. Pattens are thick, wooden soles roughly shaped in the outline of the human foot (in the shoemaker’s notion of that member), mounted on a round or oval ring of iron, fixed by two or three pins to the sole, in such a way that when the patten is worn the sole of the wearer’s foot is about two inches above the ground. A heel-piece with buckles and straps, strings or buttons and leather loops, and a strap over the toe, retain the patten in place upon the foot when the wearer trips along. (See [here].) Clogs serve the same purpose, but are simply wooden soles tipped and shod with iron. These also have heel-pieces and straps of various materials—from the heavy serviceable leather shown in the clogs [here] and [here] to the fine brocade clogs made and worn by two brides and pictured [here]. Dainty brass tips and colored morocco straps made a really refined pair of clogs. Poplar wood was deemed the best wood for pattens and clogs. Sometimes the wooden sole was thin, and was cut at the line under the instep in two pieces and hinged. These hinges were held to facilitate walking. Children also wore clogs. (See [here].) Clogs, as worn by English and American folk, did not raise the wearer as high above the mud and mire as did pattens, but I have seen Turkish clogs that were ten inches high. Chopines were worn by Englishwomen to make them look taller. Three are shown [here]. Lady Falkland was short and stout, and wore them for years to increase her apparent height; so she states in her memoirs.
It is a curious philological study that, while the words “clogs” and “pattens” for a time were constantly heard, the third name which has survived till to-day is the oldest of all—“galoshes.” Under the many spellings, galoe-shoes, goloshes, gallage, galoche, and gallosh, it has come down to us from the Middle Ages. It is spelt galoches in Piers Plowman. In a Compotus—or household account of the Countess of Derby in 1388 are entries of botews (boots), souters (slippers), and “one pair of galoches, 14 d.” Clogs, or galoches, were known in the days of the Saxons, when they were termed “wife’s shoes.”
A “galage” was a shoe “which has nothing on the feet but a latchet”; it was simply a clog. In February, 1687, Judge Sewall notes, “Send my mothers Shoes &; Golowshoes to carry to her.” In 1736 Peter Faneuil sent to England for “Galoushoes” for his sister. Another foot-covering for slippery, icy walking is named by Judge Sewall. He wrote on January 19, 1717, “Great rain and very Slippery; was fain to wear Frosts.” These frosts were what had been called on horses, “frost nails,” or calks. They were simply spiked soles to help the wearer to walk on ice. A pair may be seen at the Deerfield Memorial Hall. Another pair is of half-soles with sharp ridges of iron, set, one the length of the half-sole, the other across it.
Chopines, Seventeenth Century. In the Ashmolean Museum.