MOS MAIORUM ROMA
Association of Historical Study and Reconstruction
Re-enactment
Leather working
The Sutor
The sutor was a well-known and well-identified professional figure, of great skill as he had to make shoes which, at a certain point in Roman history, became a sort of status symbol for the citizens of the empire, identifying, from the type and level of elaboration and refinement, those belonging to the various classes.
The Romans, both in the Urbe and in the provinces, were also particularly demanding when it came to fashion.
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The sutor is depicted, for instance on some sarcophagi, as seated astride a narrow bench, with a form and a skin in front of him on a ledge attached to the bench, with a hammer in his hand working the skin.
Another funerary monument depicts the sutor Caius Iulius Helios and above him two forms one of which is wearing a caligula.
Considering that Helios's tomb was built not only for him but also for his family and freedmen, one deduces that he was a wealthy citizen; this is not surprising considering that he may have been an authorised supplier to the Roman army.
It is not clear whether each sutor specialised in making a single specific shoe or offered a diversified production; there are in fact more specific definitions of this profession, such as Solearii, who produced solae, a kind of open slipper-like shoes, Sandalarii, Caligarii etc. However, it can be assumed that a good sutor could create a certain variety of footwear.
Numa Pompilius, the legendary second king of Rome, is believed to have divided the Romans into colleges of craftsmen, the fifth of which was that of the shoemakers, whose meeting place would have been a special building called the atrium sutorium. That of the sutor is therefore a very ancient trade.
The use and working of leather in Rome was widespread and archaeological evidence has revealed that it was used to make a large number of artefacts, both civil and military, such as footwear, belts, various trimmings, saddlery and reins for horses, military tents, etc.
​The leather trade was therefore a flourishing business; goat, sheep, cow, bull and ox hides were processed and tanned by impregnating or infusing them with liquids enriched with tree bark (mainly oak), mineral salts, animal bile and some type of tannin.
The process seems to have been extremely unpleasant due to the production of foul odour and the tanneries were not very popular in the neighbourhood! Large tannery vats have been found under the present-day church of Santa Cecilia in Trastevere and the tanning industry was probably confined ‘beyond the river’, i.e. outside the city centre, precisely because of the smell.
Tanneries as well as leather and shoe shops have also been unearthed in Pompeii.
​Shoes were generally worn in their natural colour and only the wealthy could afford skins dyed in black, red or other colours. For black, melanteria, a kind of vitriol, was used, or sometimes tar or pitch was used, hence the name pissygros (pitch worker) by which the Greeks referred to shoemakers.
Other colours, such as white, gold and purple would also be referred to later (4th century A.D.) in Emperor Diocletian's price edict.