{"id":17896,"date":"2019-09-13T01:39:07","date_gmt":"2019-09-13T01:39:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/?p=17896"},"modified":"2019-09-25T04:51:32","modified_gmt":"2019-09-25T04:51:32","slug":"the-bizarre-social-history-of-beds","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/the-bizarre-social-history-of-beds\/","title":{"rendered":"The bizarre social history of beds"},"content":{"rendered":"

Brian Fagan<\/a>, University of California, Santa Barbara<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

Groucho Marx once joked<\/a>, \u201cAnything that can\u2019t be done in bed isn\u2019t worth doing at all.\u201d You might think he was referring to sleeping and sex. But humans, at one time or another, have done just about everything in bed.<\/p>\n

And yet, despite the fact that we spend one-third of our lives in bed<\/a>, they\u2019re more of an afterthought.<\/p>\n

I certainly didn\u2019t think much about beds until I found myself talking about their history with the executives of a mattress company. These humble artifacts, I learned, had a big story to tell \u2013 one that\u2019s 77,000 years old.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s when, according to archaeologist Lynn Wadley<\/a>, our early African ancestors started to sleep in hollows dug out of cave floors \u2013 the first beds. They wrapped themselves in insect-repelling grasses to avoid bed bugs as persistent as those of today\u2019s seedy motels.<\/p>\n

Much about our beds have remained unchanged for centuries. But one aspect of the bed has undergone a dramatic shift.<\/p>\n

Today, we usually sleep in bedrooms with the door shut firmly behind us. They\u2019re the ultimate realm of privacy. No one else is allowed in them, aside from a spouse or lover.<\/p>\n

But as I show in my forthcoming book, \u201cWhat We did in Bed<\/a>,\u201d it wasn\u2019t always this way.<\/p>\n

Beds full of \u2018buck and babble\u2019<\/h2>\n

The structure of the bed has remained remarkably consistent: We know that raised frames with mattresses were being used in Malta and Egypt<\/a> by 3000 B.C., which means that people have been using them for over 5,000 years.<\/p>\n

Early Egyptian beds were little more than rectangular wooden frames with legs and leather or fabric sleeping platforms. The upper end was often angled slightly upwards<\/a>. Grass, hay and straw stuffed into sacks or cloth bags served as a scratchy mattress for centuries.<\/p>\n

But one thing that has changed is who has occupied the bed. For most of human history, people thought nothing of crowding family members or friends into the same bed.<\/p>\n

The 17th-century diarist Samuel Pepys often slept with male friends and rated their conversation skills. One of his favorites<\/a> was the \u201cmerry Mr. Creed,\u201d who provided \u201cexcellent company.\u201d In September 1776, John Adams and Benjamin Franklin famously shared a bed in a New Jersey inn with only one small window. Adams kept it shut, but Franklin wanted it open, complaining that he would suffocate without fresh air. Adams won the battle<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Travelers often slept with strangers. In China and Mongolia, kangs<\/a> \u2013 heated stone platforms \u2013 were used in inns as early as 5000 B.C. Guests supplied the bedding and slept with fellow tourists.<\/p>\n

Bedding down with strangers could lead to some awkwardness. The 16th-century English poet Andrew Buckley complained of bedmates<\/a> who \u201cbuck and babble, some commeth drunk to bed.\u201d<\/p>\n

Then there was the Great Bed of Ware \u2013 a massive bed kept in an inn in a small town in entral England. Built with richly decorated oak around 1590, the four-post bed is about the size of two modern double beds. Twenty-six butchers and their wives \u2013 a total of 52 people \u2013 are said to have spent a night in the Great Bed in 1689<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"\"
An 1877 drawing of the Great Bed of Ware.<\/span>
\nHarper’s New Monthly Magazine<\/a><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Holding court<\/h2>\n

While regular people crammed into beds, royalty often slept alone or with their spouse. But their bedrooms were hardly bastions of privacy.<\/p>\n

The ceremonial bedding of newlyweds was a public spectacle for a royal court. After a royal wedding, a form of symbolic intercourse often occurred in front of numerous witnesses<\/a>.<\/p>\n

After the feast, the bride was undressed by her ladies and put to bed. The groom would then arrive in his nightshirt, sometimes accompanied by musicians. The bed curtains were then drawn, yet the guests sometimes wouldn\u2019t leave until they saw the couple\u2019s naked legs touching, or heard suggestive noises. The following morning, the stained bed linen was displayed as proof of consummation.<\/p>\n

And why go to an office when you can rule from the bedroom? Each morning, Louis XIV of France would sit in his bed, bolstered by pillows, and preside over elaborate gatherings<\/a>. Surrounded by courtiers like the gossipy Lord Saint-Simon, he composed decrees and consulted with high officials.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
King Louis XIV\u2019s bedroom was a royal staging ground.<\/span>
\nV_E\/Shutterstock.com<\/a><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

From public to private<\/h2>\n

During the 19th century, beds and bedrooms gradually became private spheres. A major impetus was rapid urbanization during the Industrial Revolution. In cities, compact row houses were constructed<\/a> with small rooms, each with a specific purpose, one of which was sleeping.<\/p>\n

Another reason was religion. The Victorian era was a devout age, and Evangelical Christianity was pervasive by the 1830s<\/a>. Such beliefs placed great emphasis on marriage, chastity, the family, and the bond between parent and child; allowing strangers or friends under the covers was no longer kosher. By 1875, Architect magazine had published an essay<\/a> declaring that a bedroom used for anything other than sleeping was unwholesome and immoral.<\/p>\n

Bedrooms reserved for adults and children became commonplace in affluent 19th century homes. Husbands and wives sometimes even had separate bedrooms<\/a>, perhaps connected by a door, each with their own adjoining dressing rooms.<\/p>\n

Self-help books advised Victorian housewives about how to decorate their bedrooms. In 1888, writer and interior decorator Jane Ellen Panton recommended<\/a> bright colors, washstands, chamber pots and, above all, a \u201clong chair,\u201d where a wife could rest when overwhelmed.<\/p>\n

Tech knocks down the door<\/h2>\n

Today, bedrooms are still considered sanctuaries \u2013 a calming place to recuperate from the chaos of everyday life. Portable technology, however, has wormed its way under our covers.<\/p>\n

A survey from earlier this year<\/a> found that 80% of teens brought their mobile devices into their bedrooms at night; nearly one-third slept with them.<\/p>\n

In a way, technology has reverted the bed to its earlier role: a place to socialize \u2013 chatting with friends, maybe even strangers \u2013 late into the night. And we can only wonder how many tweets President Trump has composed while burrowed under his blankets<\/a>.<\/p>\n

But in some ways, the effects of these glowing bedmates seem to be a bit more pernicious. One study<\/a> surveyed couples who brought their smartphones to bed with them; more than half said the devices caused them to miss out on quality time with their partner. In another study<\/a>, participants who banished smartphones from the bedroom reported being happier and having a better quality of life. Maybe that\u2019s because these devices eat into our sleep<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Then again, I\u2019m not so sure my sleep would be much better if I were to bed down with drunk strangers, as Andrew Buckley did.<\/p>\n

Nadia Durrani is a contributing author of this article.<\/em><\/p>\n

[ Thanks for reading! We can send you The Conversation\u2019s stories every day in an informative email. Sign up today.<\/a><\/em> ]\"The<\/p>\n

Brian Fagan<\/a>, Distinguished Professor Emeritus in Anthropology, University of California, Santa Barbara<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

This article is republished from The Conversation<\/a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Brian Fagan, University of California, Santa Barbara Groucho Marx once joked, \u201cAnything that can\u2019t be done in bed isn\u2019t worth doing at all.\u201d You might think he was referring to sleeping and sex. But humans, at one time or another, have done just about everything in bed. And yet, despite the fact that we spend […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":17893,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[293],"tags":[5798,6929,6926,191,6928,6925,4506,162,6927,487],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17896"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17896"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17896\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18023,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17896\/revisions\/18023"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17893"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17896"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17896"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17896"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}