another man's shoes
Preserved but no longer current.
Meaning · English
"To stand in another man's shoes" is to occupy the place of another. Among the ancient Northmen, when a man adopted a son, the person adopted put on the shoes of the adopter.
Era: ca. 1898 (Victorian)
Sources & notes
Reproduced from Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase and Fable (1898 edition, public domain; archive.org, retrieved 2026-07-31; OCR text, minor errors possible). Reflects the scholarship and attitudes of its era.
Common questions
What does “another man's shoes” mean?
"To stand in another man's shoes" is to occupy the place of another. Among the ancient Northmen, when a man adopted a son, the person adopted put on the shoes of the adopter.
Is “another man's shoes” formal or informal?
No register label has been reviewed yet — treat it as neutral and check the usage notes above.