Footprint

Footprints are the impressions or images left behind by a person walking or running. Hoofprints and pawprints are those left by animals with

Footprints can be followed when

The print left behind at a

Some detective work is relatively immediate, with criminals being tracked by the footprints they left in the snow leading from the crime scene to their home or hiding place. This is usually reported as a humorous story in news publications.^[2][3]

Footprints can also allow the detective to find the approximate height from,^[4] footprint and shoeprint. The Foot tends to be approximately 15% of the person's average height.^[5][6] Individualistic characteristics of the footprints like numerous creases, flatfoot character, horizontal and vertical ridges, corns, deformities etc. can help the forensic scientist in cases pertaining to criminal identification.^[5] In some forensic cases, the need may also arise to estimate body weight from the size of the footprints.^[7]

Footprints have been shown to have determine the height and the sex of the individual.

Ridge patterns

Friction ridge skin present on the soles of the feet and toes (plantar surfaces) is as unique in its ridge detail as are the fingers and palms (palmar surfaces). When recovered at crime scenes or on items of evidence, sole and toe impressions can be used in the same manner as finger and palm prints to effect identifications. Footprint (toe and sole friction ridge skin) evidence has been admitted in courts in the United States since 1934.^[8]

The footprints of infants, along with the thumb or index finger prints of mothers, are still commonly recorded in hospitals to assist in verifying the identity of infants. Often, the only identifiable ridge detail that can be seen on a baby's foot is from the large toe or adjacent to the large toe.

It is not uncommon for military records of flight personnel to include bare foot inked impressions. Friction ridge skin protected inside flight boots tends to survive the trauma of a plane crash (and accompanying fire) better than fingers. Even though the US

Ancient footprints

Footprints have been preserved as

An international team's discovery of a set of 1.5 million-year-old human ancestor footprints in Ileret, Kenya provides the earliest direct evidence of a modern human style of upright walking. The team believe that the prints were probably formed by the species Homo erectus.^[9]

Further, in September 2021, scientists reported the discovery of human footprints in the state of New Mexico that are understood to be 23,000 years old, around the time of the last Ice Age.^[11] Later studies, reported in October 2023, confirmed that the age of the human footprints to be "up to 23,000 years old".^[12][13]

Other footprint findings

• Lark Quarry Dinosaur Trackways, the only known palaeontological record of a dinosaur stampede^[14]
• hominin-like footprints from the Miocene era (5.7 million years ago) discovered in Crete
  .
• Laetoli – human footprints from the Pliocene era (3.7 million years ago) preserved in volcanic ash^[15]
• Siwa Oasis in Egypt – hominid footprint over 3 million years old^[16]
• Koobi Fora – 1.5 million-year-old hominin footprints in Kenya showing essentially modern bipedal locomotion^[17]
• The Ciampate del Diavolo in Italy are a series of hominid footprints in solidified ash from the eruption of a volcano 345,000 years ago
• Acahualinca – 2,100-year-old human footprints fossilized in volcanic ash and mud in Nicaragua^[18]
• carbon dated to 4200 BC preserved in clay^[19]
• Hawaii Volcanoes National Park – Footprint impressions found in the Ka’u Desert ash within Hawaii Volcanoes National Park^[20]
• Footprints of Eve – the oldest known footprints of an anatomically modern human^[21]
• 1790 Footprints – a set of footprints on the island of Hawaii
• Happisburgh footprints – footprints of about five adult and children members of Homo antecessor dating to more than 800,000 years before present, found at Happisburgh in England^[22]
• Pilauco footprint, the oldest footprint found in the Americas^[23]
• Paluxy dinosaur trackways and footprints in the Paluxy riverbed.

Footprints in myth and legend

The appearance of footprints, or marks interpreted as footprints, have led to numerous myths and legends. Some locations use such imprints as tourist attractions.

Détailed article Petrosomatoglyph

Examples of footprints in myth and legend include:

• Buddha.^[24]
• The Devil's Footprints – an unexplained series of hoof-like marks that appeared in Devon, England on 8 February 1855 after a light snowfall during the night.^[25]
• Golden calf – in Islam dust from the hoofprints of Haizum, the winged horse of archangel Gabriel, is used to animate the Golden calf.^[26]
• giant Moso stepped over to Samoa from Fiji, and the other footprint can be found on Viti Levu
  , the largest island of Fiji.
• Footprints of Bigfoot, a cryptozoological animal, are said to give proof to its existence.
• Adam
  .
• The reputed print of the right foot of Jesus is preserved in the Mosque of the Ascension in Jerusalem.
• A set of
  Church of Domine Quo Vadis outside of Rome
  .
• A mark in stone of the paving of the
  Munich Frauenkirche
  is known as the Teufelstritt ("Devil's Footstep").

The imagery of footprints has been used in many areas of popular culture. Several poems and songs have been written about them, with the Christian poem Footprints being one of the best known.

Prints or impressions of a child's feet can be kept as a memento by parents.^[27] Usually this is done using paint. The impressions of celebrity's feet, usually in concrete, may be kept in a collection such as that outside Grauman's Chinese Theatre.

See also

• Ecological footprint
• Fingerprint
• Footstep
• Petrosomatoglyph
• Pugmark
• Digital footprint

References