Whether we’re walking over a bed of hot coals or teetering on the red carpet in a pair of Manolos, our feet are fundamental.  Evidence for human feet dates back 3.5 million years to the tracks of three upright ancestors who hotfooted it through volcanic ash. 70 million years before that, as primates took to the trees, feet became touch-sensitive and skilled for climbing and grasping.  We humans, however, became and remain the only species able to copulate standing face to face supported by our feet.

Once we discovered the connection between the nerves in our toes and those under our “fig leaves,” the natural thing to do was to decorate this erogenous zone – or cover it up.  Those coveted Jimmy Choos have their beginning in the 16th century when the ladies of Florence went mad for the elevated footwear of Spain, the chopine - a kind of platform shoe.  As the styles became higher and higher, miscarriages from falls became so commonplace that the shoes were outlawed until a clever cobbler hollowed out the platform at the ball of the foot and created the first high-heeled shoes that a woman could actually walk in without risking life and limb.  Catherine de Medici went shoe-mad and the rest is orthopedic history.

Eroticism of the foot reached a high point in 1842.  A pair of old toe shoes, which had belonged to the famous Italian ballerina Maria Taglioni, was sold for 200 rubles.  The besotted fan who bought them, a Russian nobleman, had them cooked and served to him with a sauce.

FootageBank HD has images of the pedal extremities, both human and otherwise, all in High Definition – with or without sauce.  To view and download some of our foot clips, click here.