Many merchants draw inspiration from traditional folk pillows. This also made some young people interested in ancient pillows. In all kinds of costume dramas, the pillows we see are not only hard, but also often higher than today's pillows. Can such bedding really guarantee the quality of sleep? Did the ancients really use such hard pillows? Today, let's lean on pillows and walk into the dreams of the ancients.
We are not sure when the use of pillows began, but in ancient Egyptian tombs, pillows have been used as an important part of funerary objects. China also unearthed early bamboo pillows in tombs during the Warring States period. According to Joel Levy, pillows were used in early Mesopotamia in 7000 BC. All kinds of discoveries can prove that pillows, as a daily necessities, have a long history. But the above archaeological findings are not the original form of pillows. This kind of bedding, as a daily necessities, can be traced back to primitive times.
Due to the limitation of human body structure, the nerves and muscles in the neck will be more nervous when lying flat. In work and life, human beings gradually find that leaning their heads against a slightly higher object can get more rest. So we began to consciously choose some objects with suitable height and shape as early pillows. Many scholars speculate that grass trees, stones, folded skin and bent arms have all been used as pillows by primitive people.
Shuowen Jiezi interprets the word "pillow" as "the one who lies down and recommends the head, follows the wood and makes a sound". Among them, the recommendation refers to the haystack, which is a straw mat woven with licorice. After the early development, the pillow slowly took shape. And there are many kinds. The rectangular hard pillow in various costume dramas is just one of them. This is just a rough calculation. There are many styles of pillows in ancient China, including grass pillows, jade pillows, porcelain pillows, prison pillows, rattan pillows, cloth pillows, and not only simple hard pillows.
At the latest in the Western Han Dynasty, soft cloth pillows appeared. A silk pillow was unearthed from Mawangdui Han Tomb in Changsha, Hunan Province, which can also be explained from the side. In ancient times, hard pillows were not unique, and soft pillows also played an important role in the lives of ordinary people. In addition to the luxurious silk pillows used by rich princes, ordinary people also use cloth pillows.
Cloth pillows and even cloth pillows can be seen in Huaiyin summer paintings in Song Dynasty and Yuan Dynasty. In the Qing Dynasty, silk and cloth pillows began to appear in large numbers, but for ordinary people, the contents of pillows were not cotton, but orange stalks or buckwheat. Pillows made of cloth began to appear in the late Qing Dynasty, which have been passed down to this day and can still be seen in various places for daily life.
The ancients not only had cloth pillows, they also laid pillows called. Pillow towel, keep the pillow clean and cool. Today's costume dramas mostly use rectangular hard pillows as props, mainly because most civilian cloth pillows can't be well preserved, and naturally they can't be passed down as cultural relics. Therefore, what is preserved and talked about are porcelain pillows, jade pillows and hard pillows that are easier to preserve and have more changes in shape and decoration.
For us who are used to sleeping in all kinds of cotton pillows and health pillows, it seems impossible to rest our heads on hard porcelain all night. But for the ancients, hard pillows were very common. There are also many conveniences in using hard pillows.
On a hot summer night, for the ancients, the only way to cool down was to turn on the fan. Porcelain pillows can provide coolness that cloth pillows can't bring. This function always appears in various poems, such as Li Qingzhuo's "Jade pillow gauze kitchen, cool out in the middle of the night" and "Let porcelain pillow cool itself in summer", all of which show us the cooling effect of porcelain pillow. In order to strengthen this function, ancient craftsmen also made porcelain pillows hollow and punched holes on both sides to make them better ventilated.
The second function of the hard pillow is about the health care function that was loved in ancient times. This is also common in ancient books. For example, there is a record about this kind in Compendium of Materia Medica: "Long-term porcelain pillows can clear the heart and improve eyesight, and they can read fine books until they are old." From today's point of view, this kind of hard pillow is still very helpful to health.
Because most of the ancients put their necks on hard pillows, this material can support the cervical spine and better fit the natural curvature of the cervical spine, which has a certain effect on relieving cervical spondylosis. Another unexpected function of the hard pillow is to store things. In ancient times, the behavior of hiding things in pillows has a long history, and even some ancient books were directly named "Books in Pillows".
In Historical Records, we can also see the records of the secret volumes in the pillow presented by Liu Gengsheng, a Chinese doctor. In various martial arts novels, we can also see the bridge where martial arts secrets are put in the pillow. Not only that, pillows can also be used to place weapons for self-defense. It is recorded in the History of Song Dynasty that Li Guang hid the dagger in a pillow box and made an agreement with his family that he would take the dagger to death after the city was broken. Due to the above advantages, hard pillows have always existed in the lives of the ancients and have been developed by leaps and bounds.
For the ancients, sleeping hard things has always been a special thing, whether it is waiting for a pillow, sleeping alone, enjoying a corner pillow, studying hard after waking up, or sleeping with a pillow after the death of a loved one, but for us now, it is more important to ensure a good sleep and improve our mental state. We can't change the social pressure on private space, but it doesn't mean that we should stop caring about ourselves, so please choose a pillow you like and have a good sleep.