No high-heeled shoes : what do you know about foot binding?

 

Footbinding.  Ewwwwwwwwww.  

BEFORE WE BEGIN...

THIS ENTRY WILL HAVE SOME EROTIC IMAGES, SO PROCEED WITH CAUTION.  EACH OF THESE PICTURES DO HAVE A PURPOSE, BUT HAVE A CARE IF YOU DON'T LIKE FRANK DEPICTIONS OF EITHER EROS, OR SEX.

Again, proceed at your own risk, Dear Reader!

Alright, who would willingly do this to their child's feet? Well, the answer is culture.  If culture deems it essential that a  woman's beauty and marriageable qualities are shown in tiny feet, then ... oh dear, you know what happened next, Dear Reader.

We know little about the exact beginning of foot binding in China.  What indications we do have begin ca. the 10th century (AD), among the Chinese court dancers,. a fashion that gradually spread to elites in the Song Dynasty.  And, by the Qing dynasty (1636–1912), foot binding had spread to most social classes.

Another explanation holds that foot binding was chiefly "inspired by a tenth-century court dancer named Yao Niang who bound her feet into the shape of a new moon. She entranced Emperor Li Yu by dancing on her toes inside a six-foot golden lotus festooned with ribbons and precious stones."

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/why-footbinding-persisted-china-millennium-180953971/

But, really, who the hell knows why certain standards of beauty exist, or whence they began? To my mind, foot binding remains one of the more brutal, yet remarkable examples of idiosyncratic pulchritude.

An ideal of erotic beauty

Take a good look at this image.  The woman's tiny tiny tiny feet, clad in white silk socks, with tiny tiny tiny tiny red slippers. Such feet were considered not only beautiful, but erotic.  As we saw in my late posts, tight laced corsets, and the resultant impossible body type, was considered desirable by nineteenth century European standards, whereas a woman with tiny (3-6 inch feet) was considered to be the bees knees by the Chinese.

By the time the practice took hold, girls of five and six years were having their feet repeatedly broken, and tightly bound with silken cords, which were wound around the big toe, pushing the little toes under, towards the sole of the foot.  Further, the limb itself was broken in half, and bound with those same scarves around the ankle.  It resulted in this:

Foot binding was not really challenged in China (save for a few examples), until almost the mid-twentieth century.  I know, I know.  An article entitled "Bound Feet in China" (MILTNER, LEO J.. BOUND FEET IN CHINA. The Journal of Bone & Joint Surgery 19(2):p 314-319, April 1937.) was one of the first western publications to challenge the practice, characterizing it as a barbarity (duh).  The process was at last seen as dangerous, one that could result in paralysis, gangrene, ulceration, or death (i.e. infection), if the process were not carried out successfully.  It must also be stated, that the process of binding the foot was a continual one, as the problem of growth doesn't ever truly cease for the human body.

But, why erotic? Who can tell what one culture finds sexually stimulating, another may find the opposite.  I cannot answer that question, save to tell you that for the Chinese, a woman's small white stockinged feet, clad in miniscule red silk slippers...well, take a look for yourself:

What becomes erotic, sometimes inspires other behaviors...

Like men drinking wine from a "lotus" shoe as a prelude to consummation.

You know, in the last few entries, I've been taking a look at fashion trends in periods of history, that have boggled my mind.  Admittedly, I'm not a fashion historian, and can only do my best.

Do let me know what you think, Dear Reader?

P.S.  A Golden Lotus Shoe: