Deeper Dive: A Brief History of Sleep

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Announcer: This is a Getty podcast.

[Rising, meditative music]

Lilit Sadoyan:  Hello, I’m Lilit Sadoyan, the host of OMMM, Our Museum Mindfulness Meditation podcast, Getty’s first video podcast. Welcome to this Deeper Dive, where we explore the themes of our weekly episodes with experts in everything from astrology to clouds on Mars.

Roger Ekirch: To the extent that we don’t possess sufficient sleep today, it’s largely a matter of our own making.

Sadoyan: This week, we did a yogic sleep meditation inspired by an ornate 18th-century bed. I spoke with Virginia Tech professor Roger Ekirch, a sleep historian, about sleep habits 250 years ago and how they compare to today. Now let’s dive in.

[on video call] Roger, thank you so much for joining me today. The global sleep economy is estimated to be close to a 600 billion dollar industry, and we have high-tech wearables to track our sleep, blue light blocking glasses, sleep stories, meditation apps, and mattresses that monitor our sleep. And yet, I know personally, and statistically, that most people feel like they aren’t getting enough sleep these days. So I’d love to hear from you. Were people just as sleep-deprived in the 18th century?

Ekirch: They were more often sleep deprived in the 18th century. In fact not everyone may agree with me, but never before in recorded human history has the quality of sleep or the potential for quality sleep been better than today.

In the 18th century, people from all classes took their sleep extraordinarily seriously, given the threats to both sound and safe slumber that existed. This was the pre-analgesic, pre-penicillin age. A cold was not merely a source of discomfort, but, uh, it could manifest into a much more serious illness such as pneumonia. If you had asthma, you had to sit up in a chair while you slept through the night. There were bugs. The, uh—unholy trinity of lice, fleas, and bedbugs that disrupted rest. Rooms were not climate controlled like today. Roofs that don’t leak, which was a common problem, even in the most luxurious households. Storms, because there was no insulation and because people feared that a roof might be torn off kept individuals up all night.

Not only were there practical problems, there were any number of supernatural perils in the 18th century that still were deeply feared. Not only the “Prince of Darkness” himself, but demons, uh, witches, any number of minions that the devil let loose, especially during the dead of night, which was between 12 and and 3 am.

Burglars—anyway, these are problems that most of us, fortunately, do not have to contend with. To the extent that we don’t possess sufficient sleep today, it’s largely a matter of our own making. Uh, to be sure, there are large numbers of people who are obligated to work two jobs. But for most individuals above the poverty line, the decision to stay up late is, um, is really theirs to make.

Sadoyan: It’s really fascinating all the considerations and—of things that affected one’s sleep in the 18th century. Nowadays, we’re thinking about, you know, is the room the right temperature? Is there, you know, is it dark enough? Um, are you making sure that you’re not bringing any work into your bed so that you associate it exclusively with sleep? Make sure that you’re not drinking alcohol or caffeine before going to bed, and these are all things that, you know, have been suggested and proven to be more conducive to better sleep at night. So what was—what was sleep hygiene like in the 18th century? What were the conditions that made sleep optimal in that period?

Ekirch: [laughs] I can assure you that people took their sleep extraordinarily seriously, and they went to great lengths. Arguably most important of all in preparing for sleep at night was prayer. There were special prayers, indeed to be recited, oftentimes by families holding their hands together, asking God for protection from all the threats that existed. Most of all, of course, the devil, who, as one person put it, never, never sleeps. Very important was to let dogs loose, or in the case of one household, I read geese. Geese make a tremendous racket if someone enters a household at night. [laughs]

Individuals, in some cases, consumed alcohol—what was known in Germany as a sleeping drink just before they entered bed—even though we know that while alcohol can induce sleep for perhaps a few hours, it’s a source of restless sleep beyond that, to be sure. For the upper classes…laudanum, a diluted mixture of opium, was very popular.

People went to great measures—if they were fortunate enough to have a bed, which, by the way, typically was the most valued article of furniture in any household—went to great measures to make sure that their beds were sufficiently warm by using pans of charcoal or hot bricks. They could never, never be damp from washing, hence the saying, “Better dirt than death.” To have a bedmate was a great source, not only of warmth, but also of security. Even aristocrats—it was the unusual household that wherein people did not have bedmates or bedfellows to sleep with, oftentimes the same individual over a period of years, whether we’re talking about two sisters or, uh, on a more temporary scale [laughs], a traveling peddler who was in need of shelter. The important thing was that you did not put him closest to the door in case he was a member of a gang of robbers that he might then let in.

Sadoyan: It sounds like people of all classes are really going through such great lengths to assure the quality and the safety of their sleep. So was there an ideal number of hours that one could or should get in the 18th century? Now we aim for, you know, seven to nine, right? What about in the 18th century?

Ekirch: Precisely the same. In most medical journals and diaries, that was the ambition, at least, the ideal. There’s a wonderful diary by an 18th-century craftsman, Thomas Turner, who at the beginning of every year, he takes an oath that he records in writing that he will be in bed before 9 or 10. The next page, he berates himself for having returned home from a vestry meeting at 2 am very drunk. In the 18th century, uh, really throughout Western history, prior to the Industrial Revolution in the 19th century, the predominant pattern of sleep was biphasic, also known as, segmented sleep, whereby individuals, if they went to bed as they were supposed to between 9 and 10 pm, they would then sleep for three, three and a half hours, awaken at some point not long after midnight, remain conscious for up to an hour or more in which they did practically anything and everything. And then they would take a second sleep, uh, roughly of the same duration, three to three and a half hours, and wake up around dawn.

I have found references to biphasic sleep, numerous references, the earliest being in Homer’s Odyssey. Among other activities that people resorted to, apart from their chamber pots, were chores that required little light and were unskilled: preparing a meal for breakfast, reflecting upon dreams—and it’s never during the day, were surroundings, needless to say, so quiet in general and so dark. Perfect conditions for communing with God, whether through dreams or prayers, uh, special prayers to be said in the middle of the night, or, as it was put, between sleeps. Waking up in the middle of the night after one’s first sleep, remaining awake for up to an hour or so, and then taking one’s second sleep, these were not viewed as a sleep disorder. In fact, they were thought utterly natural as they had been, arguably, since time immemorial until the Industrial Revolution and the prevalence of artificial lighting and the birth of values that emphasized efficiency, ambition, whereby sleep increasingly became viewed as a necessary evil. It is not coincidental, in my view and a number of sleep scientists have echoed this observation, that middle of the night insomnia today, from which so many people suffer—it’s the most common sleep disorder in the industrialized world, to be sure, for many it is a disorder—but for many individuals, it’s an echo, it’s a remnant, of this older pattern of sleep.

Sadoyan: Roger, this was all so fascinating. I learned so much about sleep in the early modern period. I know our listeners did, too. So I just wanted to say thank you again for joining our podcast.

Ekirch: Thank you. I’m very flattered to have been invited, Lilit. Sweet dreams.

Sadoyan: [laughs] You as well. Thank you.

[Light music plays]

To find the related meditation and see images, transcripts, and additional resources, visit our website at getty dot edu slash ommm. That’s O-M-M-M.