The History of Socks
From matted animal-hair wraps to today’s engineered performance yarns — a short history of one of the oldest garments.
The earliest known surviving pair of socks, created by naalbinding (an early looping technique), dates from 300–500 AD. Excavated at Oxyrhynchus on the Nile in Egypt, the split toes were designed to be worn with sandals — they’re on display at the Victoria & Albert Museum.
Even earlier knitted socks, from around 1500 BC, were found in Jutland (now part of Denmark), and early stockings were found in Egyptian graves at Antinoe from circa 500 AD.
For a long time, stockings were a privilege of the rich, as their manufacture was a closely guarded guild secret. In the Middle Ages, pants and stockings often formed a single piece of clothing before evolving into separate garments.
The invention of the knitting frame in 1589 began the mechanisation of sock making, and the Industrial Revolution turned it into mass production.
Today, socks are engineered products — blending cotton, wool, bamboo, Tencel and technical synthetics with cushioning, arch support and moisture management knit directly into the structure. It’s that heritage of craft plus modern engineering that Shahzad Textile builds on.
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