DOI issue:
No. 152 (November, 1905)
DOI article:Levetus, A. S.: Ancient bedsteads and cradles
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.20713#0150
Ancient Bedsteads and Cradles
ANTEPENDIUM OF ALTAR
(In the Figdor Collection)
LATE I5TH CENTURY
manger (In the Figdor Collection)
132
with the skins of the animals they had killed in the
chase. From the floor to the low wooden plank,
which served as sofa by day and bed by night, was
but a step in the stage of civilisation.
The marriage bed, which in Germany consisted1
of two bedsteads placed side by side, as it does to
this day, was always placed in the lady’s chamber,
and hidden from sight by rich hangings suspended
from a baldachin covering the bedstead, but quite
separate from it. In this
room the mistress sat with
her maids making tapestry
or working embroidery,
and here she received her
visitors.
The simple bedsteads of
the twelfth and thirteenth
centuries gradually became
more elaborate until, with
Gothic architecture and the
desire of always soaring
higher and higher, came
the “del” or “sky,” which
took the place of the bal-
dachin. This “sky”
formed part of the bedstead
proper, and had curtains
hanging from it which
were closed entirely at
night, an arrangement
which still survives. From
the roof of the “ sky ”
often hung a lamp which
14TH century shed its dim light over the
and Persians, and that these were made of metal
and of wood, often inlaid with mother-of-pearl and
ivory. The Greeks and the Romans, too, had
bedsteads made of the same materials, the feet of
which were richly wrought. It was only, how-
ever, in the course of centuries that the Germanic
races became familiar with bedsteads. Our early
ancestors slept on the ground, we are told, their
beds consisting of leaves, straw, or rushes covered
ANTEPENDIUM OF ALTAR
(In the Figdor Collection)
LATE I5TH CENTURY
manger (In the Figdor Collection)
132
with the skins of the animals they had killed in the
chase. From the floor to the low wooden plank,
which served as sofa by day and bed by night, was
but a step in the stage of civilisation.
The marriage bed, which in Germany consisted1
of two bedsteads placed side by side, as it does to
this day, was always placed in the lady’s chamber,
and hidden from sight by rich hangings suspended
from a baldachin covering the bedstead, but quite
separate from it. In this
room the mistress sat with
her maids making tapestry
or working embroidery,
and here she received her
visitors.
The simple bedsteads of
the twelfth and thirteenth
centuries gradually became
more elaborate until, with
Gothic architecture and the
desire of always soaring
higher and higher, came
the “del” or “sky,” which
took the place of the bal-
dachin. This “sky”
formed part of the bedstead
proper, and had curtains
hanging from it which
were closed entirely at
night, an arrangement
which still survives. From
the roof of the “ sky ”
often hung a lamp which
14TH century shed its dim light over the
and Persians, and that these were made of metal
and of wood, often inlaid with mother-of-pearl and
ivory. The Greeks and the Romans, too, had
bedsteads made of the same materials, the feet of
which were richly wrought. It was only, how-
ever, in the course of centuries that the Germanic
races became familiar with bedsteads. Our early
ancestors slept on the ground, we are told, their
beds consisting of leaves, straw, or rushes covered