Is there a connection between square-toed characters and death?

I've recently read a couple of references to square-toed shoes and feet in books.The first was in There Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston. A personified character of Death is said to have "huge square toes" and then later is referenced as "Him-with-the-square-toes". I was also reading some Sherlock Holmes novels, and in two of them, Holmes finds footprints on the scene of the crime that were made by square-toed boots. I was wondering if this is a reference to something. Do you think they're related?