Beds Through the Ages

There’s no place as comfortable as one’s own bed. A firm yet yielding mattress, crisp, clean sheets, a soft duvet, clean pillows and maybe even a beloved comforter. Sleeping is one of life’s greatest pleasures and billions of dollars are spent worldwide each year on making the perfect bed. 

This hasn’t always been the case. Human beings, nomadic creatures by nature, would often sleep on cold, hard, often damp floors under make-shift shelters. Even in the agricultural age, we’d find ourselves sleeping above straw or leaves with only animal furs for warmth.

According to science periodical National Geographic, the first mattress to be discovered in 2011, dates back to over seventy thousand years ago and was made from reeds with an insect-repelling top sheet made from locally sourced greenery. It is unlikely, however, that the majority of hunter-gatherers went to these lengths to comfort and protect themselves.       

The ever-innovative ancient Egyptians were seemingly the first society to figure out that raising sleeping areas from the ground would not only improve comfort, offer protection from creepy crawlies, serpents, and rodents, but also elevate themselves socially from those who slept ground level. Those who had sufficient financial resources would have beds built with wooden frames and covered in ancient cushions.

In Ancient Rome beds were not only for sleeping. Romans of wealth and status, being of a socially progressive nature, would entertain visitors in bed, use it for a place of study, or even use the bed as a dining area. Indeed, the Romans created a wide catalogue of different kinds of bed for various activities, including the lectus genialis for newlywed couples, and the simple lectus cubicularis for sleeping. 

Medieval Europeans of wealth would also use their sleeping quarters to flaunt their social status. Ornately carved wooden beds, raised from the ground, and sometimes encrusted with jewels. The vast majority of people were bunking down on the ground with whatever they could find to keep themselves warm.   

During the Renaissance period beds as we recognize them today were designed. While the poorer members of society continued to sleep on the floor, or upon make-shift straw mattresses, the more affluent in society owned mattresses, and during this, perhaps the golden age of beds we began to see four-postered velvet-draped sleeping cribs often associated with gothic romance and horror fiction. Mattresses were suspended from the bedframes with ropes. Smart linen bed sheets were covered with woollen blankets as beds grew more and more lavish for the wealthy. 

By the 18th century bed frames were made from metal, and by the 19th Century, metal bed springs were invented. By the 20th Century the water bed was created and memory foam technology became popular. However, now, in the 21st Century we still find ourselves looking back to those classic designs of earlier generations as the benchmark in elegance and comfort when it comes to choosing the bed that is right for us.