BAX´EAE
BAX´EAE or
BAXAE, sandals made of
vegetable leaves, twigs, or fibres. According to Isidore
(
Orig. 19.33), this kind of sandal was
[p. 1.295]worn on the stage by comic, whilst the cothurnus was
appropriate to tragic actors. When, therefore, one of the characters in
Plautus (
Men. 2.3, 40) says, “Qui
extergentur baxeae?” we may suppose him to point to the sandals
on his feet. Philosophers also wore sandals of this description, at least in
the time of Tertullian (
Pall. 4) and Apuleius
(
Met. 2.28, 11.8;
Flor. 9), and
probably for the sake of simplicity and cheapness. Isidore adds, that baxeae
were made of willow (
ex salice), and that they
were also called
calones. From numerous
specimens of them discovered in the catacombs, we perceive that the
Egyptians made them of palm-leaves and papyrus. (Wilkinson,
Ancient
Egyptians, vol. ii. p. 336.) They are sometimes observable on
the feet of Egyptian statues. According to Herodotus, sandals of papyrus
(
ὑποδήματα βύβλινα, 2.37) were a part
of the required and characteristic dress of the Egyptian priests. We may
presume that he intended his words to include not only sandals made,
strictly speaking, of papyrus, but those also in which the leaves of the
date-palm were an ingredient, and of which Apuleius makes distinct mention (
“pedes palmeis baxeis indutum,”
Met. 2.8.) The accompanying woodcut shows two sandals exactly
answering to this
 |
|
Baxeae or Sandals. (British Museum.)
|
description, from the collection in the British Museum. The upper
one was worn on the right foot. It has a loop on the right side for
fastening the band which went across the instep. This band, together with
the ligature connected with it, which was inserted between the great and the
second toe, is made of the stem of the papyrus, undivided and unwrought. The
lower figure shows a sandal in which the portions of the palm-leaf are
interlaced with great neatness and regularity, the sewing and binding being
effected by fibres of papyrus. The three holes may be observed for the
passage of the band and ligature already mentioned. Tertullian speaks of
gilded
baxae (
Idol. 8), and possibly
of purple ones (
Pall. 4; but the passage is corrupt).
[
J.Y] [
J.H.F]
