Cretans went barefoot indoors, but wore shoes outside. Especially the high class never showed themselves in public without shoes or sandals. The latter were finely worked and attached above the ankles with thick thongs. These thongs were sometimes decorated with beads, but this was the height of luxury. Minoans' shoe-types included slipper shoes, moccasin-style socks, sandals, and high, closed boots for journeys. Men wore white half-boots,
business gifts, reaching to the calf. They were probably made of the same some white leather or pale chamois skin,
thanksgiving gifts, still used by Cretans shoemakers today. They could also be red with thongs tied seven times round the leg.
Women wore high boots, slippers,
Christmas gifts, sandals, and sometimes shoes with heels.
Early Minoans wore animal skins, but by 3000 BC they had mastered the art of weaving flax and,
halloween gifts, later, wool. Proof that spinning and weaving were already known in Neolithic communities is furnished by the discovery of numerous spindle-weights.
Everything connected with clothing, from sheep-shearing to cutting the cloth, was a domestic occupation, but dyeing was made by skilled professionals. The industry used vegetable pigments as well as the purple extracted from shellfish. This purple industry had a long history under the middle Minoan period, and made it possible to dye fine materials with three or four colors in varied patterns.