The Barefoot Way

Edere lascivos ad Baetica crusmata gestus et Gaditanis ludere docta modis, tendere quae tremulum Pelian Hecubaeque maritum posset ad Hectoreos sollicitare rogos, urit et excruciat dominum Telethusa priorem: vendidit ancillam, nunc redimit dominam. She who was cunning to show wanton gestures To the sound of Baetic castanets And to frolic to the tunes of Gades, She who could have roused passion in palsied Pelias, And have stirred Hecuba’s spouse even by Hector’s pyre — Telethusa burns and racks with love her former master. He sold her as his maid, now he buys her back as his mistress.

Martial, Epigrams, Book 6, LXXI
English translation by Walter C. A. Ker

The rule that women must wear heels on the red carpet of the Cannes Film Festival was introduced long ago. Last spring Kristen Stewart rebelled against the “high-heels-only” rule by taking off her Christian Louboutin heels, and walking down barefoot the famed red carpet. Photo: Andreas Rentz/Getty Images.