Editing Mattress (section)

==History==
{{See also|Bed#Etymology|Bed#History}}
[[Image:Old mattress making.jpg|thumb|right|300px|Photo on a 1940 [[United States Department of Agriculture|USDA]] circular promoting home production of cotton mattresses]]

A third-century BCE papyrus mentions a man named Krotos who is "waiting in Jaffa for an opportunity of exporting... and mattresses."<ref>P. Cairo Zen I 59093 257 BCE</ref><ref>CIJ III p 22</ref>

The word ''[[wikt:mattress|mattress]]'' derives from the [[Arabic language|Arabic]] مَطْرَحٌ (''maṭraḥ'')<ref>[http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=mattress mattress (n.) - Online Etymology Dictionary]</ref> which means "something thrown down" or "place where something is thrown down" and hence "mat, cushion". During the [[Crusades]], Europeans adopted one of the Middle Eastern methods of [[sleep]]ing on [[cushion]]s on the floor since sleeping on beds in the Middle East was for the wealthy. The word ''materas'' eventually descended into [[Middle English]] through the [[Romance languages]].<ref>[http://education.yahoo.com/reference/dictionary/entry/mattress "Mattress: Word History"]. {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070323071038/http://education.yahoo.com/reference/dictionary/entry/mattress |date=2007-03-23 }} ''The American Heritage Dictionary''.</ref> The oldest known mattress dates to around 77,000 years ago from South Africa and consisted of layers of twigs and leaves, notably including the leaves from [[Cryptocarya woodii]] which serves as a natural insect repellent and is believed to have served the additional purpose of repelling [[mosquitos]]. Preventing or reducing the number of mosquito bites would have reduced the chance [[malaria]], which continues to be spread by mosquitos throughout Africa to this day and has been estimated to be the single most common cause of death among humans historically, estimated to have caused the death of roughly half of humans that have ever lived throughout [[history of malaria|history]].<ref>{{cite news|last1=Wayman|first1=Erin|title=The World's Oldest Mattress|url=http://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/the-worlds-oldest-mattress-7513279/|access-date=6 March 2017|work=Smithsonian|date=14 December 2011|language=en}}</ref>

Early mattresses contained a variety of natural materials including straw, feathers or [[horsehair]]. In the first half of the 20th century, a typical mattress sold in North America had an innerspring core and cotton [[Batting (material)|batting]] or [[polyester|fiberfill]]. Modern mattresses usually contain either an inner [[Spring (device)|spring]] core or materials such as [[latex]], [[viscoelasticity|viscoelastic]] or other flexible [[polyurethane foam]]s. Other fill components include insulator pads over the coils that prevent the bed's upholstery layers from cupping down into the innerspring, as well as polyester fiberfill in the bed's top upholstery layers. In 1899 James Marshall introduced the first individually wrapped pocketed spring coil mattress now commonly known as [[Marshall coil]]s.

In North America, the typical mattress sold today is an innerspring; however, there is increasing interest in all-foam beds and hybrid beds, which include both an innerspring and high-end foams such as viscoelastic or [[latex]] in the comfort layers. In Europe, polyurethane foam cores and latex cores have long been popular. These make up a much larger proportion of the mattresses sold in the continent.<ref>Nelles, Barbara. "[http://bedtimesmagazine.com/2009/07/the-inside-story-foams-and-springs/ The Inside Story]". ''[http://bedtimesmagazine.com BedTimes Magazine]''. July 2009. Retrieved 2011-9-1</ref>