Emperor Diocletian's Edict on Prices of 301 and the Cost of Shoes in Denarii

In 301, Emperor Diocletian attempted to fix uniform prices for basic goods and issued the Edict on Maximum Prices. Footwear, for instance, could cost anywhere from 50 to 150 denarii. On average, that is the equivalent of 50 bricks, three weeks of a soldier's pay and two months of lessons in arithmetic. Well, my little shoes cost considerably more, but in the end Diocletian, too, ran up against this: in practice, the provisions of the edict proved extremely difficult to enforce.