Comments on: How We Used to Sleep

By: pentamom

pentamom — Mon, 27 Feb 2012 14:02:22 +0000

“Pentamon

Perhaps, the availability of cheap lighting, in the form of kerosene lamps and paraffin wax candles?”

Rural Americans went to bed with the sun and up with the chickens well into the 20th century, and they were the overwhelming majority of people through the 19th century. “Cheap” isn’t free and people remained quite frugal. I don’t think that answers why people unaffected by industrialization as far as their personal lifestyles (obviously, everyone was indirectly affected) would just stop doing what is purported to come most naturally, when it’s also purported to be most economical and efficient for them.

By: Michael PS

Michael PS — Sat, 25 Feb 2012 17:47:18 +0000

Pentamon

Perhaps, the availability of cheap lighting, in the form of kerosene lamps and paraffin wax candles?

By: Raymond Takashi Swenson

Raymond Takashi Swenson — Sat, 25 Feb 2012 16:55:50 +0000

So how does thus relate to the custom in southern Europe of going home mudday to have a large meal and a siesta, then back to work for several hours followed by staying up visiting tapa bars into the wee hours?

Also, we forget that Europe is much further north than the continental USA, basically the same as Canada, which means very long nights in winter and very short ones in summer. Just living north of the 45th parallel here in southern Washington means sunset around Christmas is at 4:30 PM.

By: pentamom

pentamom — Sat, 25 Feb 2012 15:19:06 +0000

Another question is why the custom died out so quickly due to “industrialization” when a large proportion of the population remained non-industrialized well into the 19th century, and fairly detached from the cultural pressures of the industrialized culture. Why were the factories of London and Leeds driving the sleep habits of American farm families in rural Ohio? There are a lot of unanswered questions here.

I’m not sure I get Felapton’s point about the equator, since the people discussed in the article were already living about as far from the equator as you could get (Northern Europe, British Isles) in large numbers before the modern era.

By: Michael PS

Michael PS — Sat, 25 Feb 2012 12:14:14 +0000

Where I live, in the West of Scotland, in mid-December, the sun sets at 3.47 pm and rises at 8.46 am. Allowing a half-hour of twilight after sunset and before sunrise, this still makes for a long night.

In June, of course, sunset is at 9.07 pm and sunrise at 3.34 am, so, again, deducting an hour of twilight, there would be scarcely time for a “first sleep,” never mind a second one.

As for artificial lights, most burghs had by-laws requiring fires and naked flames to be extinguished an hour after sunset, with a curfew (couvre-feu) bell being rung.

NB I have ignored “Summer Time,” which is a 20th century innovation

By: How We Used to Sleep in Medieval Days - Christian Forums

How We Used to Sleep in Medieval Days - Christian Forums — Sat, 25 Feb 2012 07:52:51 +0000

[...] lauds. It would seem they were much more conventional, and less austere, than I had supposed. http://www.firstthings.com/blogs/firstthoughts/2012/02/24/how-we-used-to-sleep/ __________________ Your socks stink. To view links or images in signatures your post count [...]

By: SouthCoast

SouthCoast — Sat, 25 Feb 2012 05:45:50 +0000

I was reminded of when, back in my days as an anthro major, I read an ethnography of the Siriono (I believe) people of South America. They would go to bed with the sun, and wake up about 2 or 3 in the morning, in their hammocks in their communal longhouses, chat amongst themselves for a while and then go back to sleep. Might be more common than we realize!

By: Felapton

Felapton — Sat, 25 Feb 2012 01:57:32 +0000

Probably two things made the custom disappear. More importantly, the invention of affordable artificial lighting made it feasible for most people to stay awake after sundown. Less importantly, technology has made it less precarious to live far from the equator. Near the equator, night is about twelve hours in all seasons; at higher latitudes, the night is short in summer and long in winter.

By: Patrick

Patrick — Sat, 25 Feb 2012 01:30:26 +0000

The divided sleep is itself interesting, but maybe more so for me is how knowledge of this custom apparently disappeared. It’s interesting to contemplate how a practice which was seemingly the norm throughout all of society could become completely forgotten.

By: Steve Billingsley

Steve Billingsley — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 20:12:56 +0000

But what about second breakfast?