In one corner of the cave we put lots of leaves, cover them with leather and we have the prehistoric mattress ready. But when they said goodbye to nomadism and humans chose a more stable lifestyle, they looked for a more comfortable base to sleep on. The mattress became a good and therefore a symbol of the social level. Thus, the Egyptian pharaohs had wooden beds protected by proud and soft handkerchiefs. Instead, the small town slept on the leaves of palm trees that had been placed on the ground. Even in Greece, those who could had beds of wood, stone or marble covered with thick cloth.

In Rome, the mattress became a meeting place. They took visits on him and made endless feasts on him. The metal beds were protected by wool mattresses and linen cloths. But even then, this luxury was only within the reach of the High Romans. The others lay on beds made of vegetable fibers. It was the Romans who invented the bed of water; they filled the matalaza with warm water, thinking it was favorable to sleep. When the empire collapsed, the mattress took the same path. In the Middle Ages, any corner of the ground became a cubicle, and straw or sawdust was commonly used to reduce the cold and hardness of the ground.

The resurrection also brought a revolution to the mattresses. The organic materials used up to that time were corrupted, and the former human cubicle quickly became the home of rats and insects. Leonardo da Vinci himself once wrote that he had to sleep “on the remains of dead creatures.” In order to improve hygiene, the straw began to be inserted into sacks; the sacks had a hole closed by buttons to renew or aerate the contents of the straw. But the humidity and the stench continued to accompany him every night until the invention of the tapestry of the French court, Guillaume Dujardin, arrived. He protected the canvas sack with wax, installed some valves and filled it with air: he made the first air mattress.

The spring mattress was invented at the beginning of the 17th century. But it was an expensive product. For this reason, during the 20th century, pure wool mattresses were the most widely used. In addition, the initial springs were cylindrical, deformed immediately, even managed to puncture the mattress, causing back problems for the person lying on it. The problem was solved in the 1850s by the German Heinrich Westphal creating conical springs. And from then on, the noise of friction between the springs, not the back but the ears, bothered them. James Marshall put a pouch on the springs and managed to protect both the back and the privacy of the users. From the 1950s, synthetic materials replaced wool, first foams and then latexes. And today, although the dream of traveling to the moon is still a utopia for most of us, we have the opportunity to sleep like astronauts.