What are the most inconspicuous items of clothing you own? Chances are the answer will be a set of garments so unheralded they may escape your attention all together as you pick out a plain old shirt or a particularly drab tie. Underwear even could considered to have a well of personality and charisma infinitely deep than the humble sock. Even the most style conscious of people have trouble expressing anything with a sock. So where do they originate? Let’s pull up some sock info for podiatrically curious…
MEANING
According to the Dictionary Of Etymology, the word sock is derived from the Latin soccus, meaning a “light, low-heeled shoe”. The word has then become associated with both purity and finality. Purity due its links with ecclesiastical orders, and finality possibly in refernce simply to the foot’s position at the end of the leg. Hence we have the expressions to ‘sock’ someone, as in to hit them, and to ‘stick a sock in it’ i.e. stop talking.
HISTORY
The origins of the word trace the existence of socks all the way back to the Ancient Greeks, who are thought to have used a weaving technique to fashion animal hair into the first ever prototypes. Furthermore, the method of simply securing an animal skin to one’s foot is well documented. Aroung 700 BC Greek poet Hesiod wrote “And on your feet bind boots of the hide of the slaughtered ox, fitting them closely, when you have cushioned their insides with felt.”
The history of the sock has since evolved through a number of guises. Egyptian tombs from the third to fifth centuries AD have revealed the earliest knitted forms, whilst Europeans simply wrapped pieces of cloth around their feet and legs. Over the next few hundred years, socks became a symbol of wealth, mostly taking the form of loose-fitting woven or fabric designs. By 1000 AD, socks symbolised purity amongst priests and holy men. Commonly referred to in Europe as ‘hose’, they have had a symbiotic relationship with the length of trousers, or ‘breeches’, and the custom at the time. Shorter breeches meant longer hose and vice-versa. For a while in the twelfth century, the two actually joined up.
MODERN DAY SOCKS
The fitted and multifarious type of socks we are all familiar with today has its roots in the development of the knitting machine and its inventor, English clergyman William Lee. The story goes that Lee set out to create it in order to distract his beloved from her knitting needles. Queen Elizabeth I denied him a patent on his first model in light of the coarse and uncomfortable nature of the foot warmers it churned out. Lee eventually secured his place in history though and paved the way to the loom and the mass manufacture of clothes. Metalwork advances added finer and finer needles, leading to a more detailed weave, and demand from rich merchants across the continent saw fashion and craftsmanship develop in tandem. By the 1900’s socks were no longer the preserve of the upper classes and became a common occurence.