Page:A History of Domestic Manners and Sentiments in England During the Middle Ages.djvu/65

 r^ and Sentiments. 45 bed in it. The bed itfelf feems ufually to have conlifted merely of a lack {fcecchig) filled with ftraw, and laid on a bench or board. Hence words uled commonly to fignify the bed itfelf were hcence (a bench), and ftreow (ftraw) : and even in king Alfred's tranflation of Bede, the llate- ment, "he ordered to prepare a bed for him," is exprefled in Anglo- Saxon by, he he/it him Jlreowne ge-gearwian, literally, he ordered to prepare llraw for him. All, in fa6t, that had to be done when a bed was wanted, was to take the bed-fack out of the cyjl, or cheft, fill it with frelh ftraw, and lay it on the bench. In ordinary houfes it is probable No. 32. Anglo-Saxon Beds. that the bench for the bed was placed in a recefs at the fide of the room, in the manner we ftill fee in Scotland 3 and hence the bed itfelt was called, among other names, cota, a cot ; cryh, a crib or ftall ; and clif or clyf, a recefs or clofet. From the fame circumftance a bedroom was called hed-dyfa or led-cleofa, and ted-cofa, a bed-clofet or bed-cove. Our cut (No. 32), taken from Alfric's verfion of Genefis (Claudius, B. iv.), reprefents beds of this^ defcription. Benches are evidently placed in receffes at the fide of the chamber, with the beds laid upon them, and the recefles are feparated from the reft of the apartment by a curtain, bed-warft or hryfte. The modern word ledjtead means, literally, no