Jonathan Bailey, Pharrell Williams and Gigi Hadid may have helped the flip-flop reach a new level of popularity. But long before thong sandals became one of the hottest shoes of 2025, King Tutankhamun was a champion of the style — and shoes were some of the thousands of items included in his tomb.
The Grand Egyptian Museum opened its doors in Cairo in November, where King Tutankhamun’s tomb and all of its contents — counting more than 5,500 items — are on display altogether. At least 82 pairs of shoes are in the tomb of the famous young pharaoh, including many from daily life and the gold burial pair placed on his feet.
A sewn sandal seen from above, made from grass, palm leaf and papyrus.
Photo by André J. Veldmeijer. Courtesy MoTA
Most of the shoes are a style referred to as “sewn sandals” crafted from grass, palm leaves and papyrus, explained archaeologist and paleontologist Dr. André J. Veldmeijer to FN. Veldmeijer is an expert on the topic, having penned the books “Tutankhamun’s : Studies of Ancient Egyptian Footwear” and “Let a Cow-Skin be Brought. Armour, Chariots and Other Leather Remains from Tutankhamun’s Tomb.”
Veldmeijer broke down the significance of the sewn sandals: “Research has shown that specifically these sandals were important status markers: they were worn by the royal family and those officials that were rewarded by the king himself. We don’t know yet why specifically these seemingly simple sandals, made of not too expensive materials, were held in such high regards.”
Veldmeijer continued, “But the golden sandals on the mummy feet — and two pairs of golden open shoes from his tomb too — were detailed remakes of the sewn sandals, with the structure of the stitching of the palm leaf around the grass cores embossed in the gold.”
A pair of open shoes (nr. 021k, l) made from gold, leather, wood and linen.
Photo by André J. Veldmeijer. Courtesy MoTA[
Among the great number of shoes, some pairs stand out among the rest. To name one example, a set of leather sandals with “very fine” open work straps and gilded bronze bosses is among the most special in the tomb.
Moreover, there are two pairs of “open shoes” featuring a low-cut upper around the back three-quarters, leaving the toes and upper section of the foot exposed. Described by Veldmeijer as “the most special examples of footwear,” the shoes made use of various materials including leather, gold, beads and wood. A multitude of techniques employed by a significant number of craftspeople would have been required to make the components — embossing gold, making different goldwire and filigree elements, creating durable leather to survive bacterial decay, coloring the leather, creating and stringing the beads to craft the outer layer of the upper and inlaying the straps with lapis lazuli and glass. The leather would likely have been colored red or green, the most popular colors in ancient Egyptian leather.
A pair of the “open shoes” was reconstructed/conserved by Grand Egyptian Museum conservators and aligns with the pair in images below labeled “021 f, g,” Veldmeijer said.
This photo taken on Nov. 4 shows a pair of sandals at the King Tutankhamun exhibition hall of the Grand Egyptian Museum in Giza, Egypt.
Sui Xiankai/Xinhua via Getty Images
Another element of the “most special” shoes — also seen in a third pair made of leather — was a unique strap configuration which has fueled speculation that they were adapted to accommodate Tutankhamun’s potentially deformed foot. A front strap is missing or combined with a strap going over the foot, a highly unusual design for ancient Egypt, as sandals exclusively featured a front strap between just the first and second toe.
Veldmeijer said, “But there is not evidence see in the footwear in terms of extraordinary pressure points that he walked differently that the usual gait of a human being.”
The explanation for that unique footwear continued: “Although we do not have [complete] examples from other royals, which might have looked the same, we do know comparable closure system in footwear from areas outside what we nowadays call Egypt.”
This could mean these shoes were inspired by an another culture or even given as a gift and slightly adapted to Egyptian ways.
A pair of open shoes (nr. 021f, g) made from gold, leather, wood and linen.
Photo by André J. Veldmeijer. Courtesy MoTA.
Artist impression of shoes 021f, g.
Copyright by Mikko H. Kriek
Studying ancient Egyptian footwear allows for a myriad of discoveries, Veldmeijer conveyed, relating to the technology of the time, the specific wearer of the shoes, the significance of fashion in connection to time and place, the availability of resources, and the wealth of families and how they might display it. Shoes also carried symbolism, from serving as status markers to indicating belonging to a specific group. For instance, luxury padded, brightly colored and highly decorated leather sandals are seen only in elite tombs in Luxor.
The expert also noted, “It has even been argued, based on the find of a single sandal in an intact burial of a young person with intact and normal anatomy, that footwear helped to ward off evil, like still is believed in parts of the world.”
While fashion wasn’t commercialized in ancient Egypt the way it is today, Veldmeijer noted how footwear styles evolved over time, an element that helps with dating. While evidence is sparse, footwear styles seemed to differ from area to area, and definitely from country to country.
Veldmeijer said, “Footwear, like clothing and basically all variables of the material culture, contains information that, all combined, help to build a picture of the ancient world and people as complete as possible — everything provides for pieces of the huge jigsaw puzzle.”
