The origin of the custom of removing the shoes was clearly to avoid soiling the carpets in the house or tent, on which the inmates sat, ate, and slept.
Felts and rush-mats, no doubt, formed the first floor-coverings for tents and houses; but as arts and manufactures grew in Central Asia, the pastoral tribes, with whom, there being little or no agricultural work for the women and children, the woollen industries began, introduced carpets with coloured designs, many of the patterns of which are known to be of very old date, and still remain in the hands of certain families as their own carefully-guarded secrets and property.

These carpets then became their pictures, framed in felt side-strips, on which people sat, slept, and transacted business.

At meals the centre is covered with a cloth, on which the dishes are placed; and I think the carpet is regarded similarly as a well-polished dining-table was in the West in olden days, when the cloth was removed at the end of the courses.

At other times it may be supposed that the pretty carpets are their pictures on the floor, just as ours are on the wall; in fact, many carpets of old design are so lovely and delicate that they are hung on the walls of European residents' houses in Persia as being too good to be trodden on.

In the village houses the peasants always leave their shoes at the inner doors, and when a man arrives in riding-boots, with no intention of staying long, he complies with the object of the custom by sitting on the edge of the carpet, or felt, and tucking his legs underneath him, so that the feet may not touch or soil it.