Page:Horse shoes and horse shoeing.djvu/227

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STUTTGART SPECIMENS.
199
fig. 65

Shoes of the second type, as shown in figure 65, are not unfrequently found in the neighbourhood of Stuttgart. They are of medium size, broad at the toe, with six or eight nail-holes, and partly grooved for the nail-holes. The sole is in some instances a little hollowed out towards the inner circumference; the calks are high, square, and placed towards the ends of the branches, something like slipper-heels (Pantoffelstollen), cut off obliquely, and in some very much prolonged. Some of these shoes have only one calk (a), which is long and pointed, while the other heel of the shoe (b), has merely an edge bent downward to match it. This shoe has a seat (richtung, curve to fit the foot) quite peculiar, the heel extremity being quite thin and tapering, and curving up towards the back part of the foot (fig. 66, a).

fig. 66

The Oriental and Arab shoes have the same bend given to them even in the present day. Since these articles correspond with the description of Spanish shoes both in their form and curve, and since Stuttgart was alternately besieged and occupied by the Spaniards in the years 1546 to 1551, and in 1638, it may be assumed with reasonable certainty that they are of Spanish origin.'