Certainly, ancient finds suggest that socks were invented for warmth. Tablet 346 of the Vindolanda Tablets contains a letter advising a soldier of the dispatch of "two pairs of socks, two pairs of sandals and two pairs of underpants". Despite the fact that these auxiliaries hailed largely from the area of the Netherlands and Northern Germany, the harsh winters of Northern Britain would have required warm footwear. It has been suggested that "socks" were some kind of binding, rather than the shaped garment of today, although the name derives from the Greek, and then the Latin word of a comic actor's soft shoe. As far as I can ascertain, the earliest shaped socks found in the archaeological record are from early Christian Egypt, where socks in the modern, foot-warming sense would not have been required.