# Why are beds elevated? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [February 22, 2012, 3:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-beds-elevated/613632 "2012-02-22T15:51:25Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![aruvqan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aruvqan/32/2891_2.png) [@aruvqan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aruvqan)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2012, 11:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-beds-elevated/613632/41 "2012-02-23T11:11:48Z")
> [@Hilarity\_N.Suze](#): > > > [@](#): > > > > ``` > > Originally Posted by **Alley Dweller** [http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/images/buttons/viewpost.gif](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=14799564#post14799564) > > Having to push yourself all the way up from the floor can be a real problem for the elderly or people with arthritis or other joint problems. > > > > ``` > > If they had habitually done it their whole life it probably wouldn’t be. Sorry, arthritis and [in my case] femoral acetabular impingements don’t work that way. Actually many joint problems are worsened by sitting on floors and the ground - damp cold just _sinks_ into the joint and stiffens it, making it purgatorial. I stopped floor sitting several years before my joints got bad enough to need a cane to aid me in moving. And FWIW, I am actually still flexible enough to get into a half lotus, popping joints, locking joints and all. I just can not get down onto the floor or get up afterwards. One of my main ways of spending time is sitting on my bed in a half lotus working on my laptop on a hospital table. ---
**Author:** ![not\_what\_you\_d\_expect](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/not_what_you_d_expect/32/3246_2.png) [@not\_what\_you\_d\_expect](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/not_what_you_d_expect)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2012, 11:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-beds-elevated/613632/42 "2012-02-23T11:44:19Z")
> [@Jackknifed\_Juggernaut](#): > > This response made me laugh out loud. You have a marvelous grasp of the obvious. [/Cheers quote] 🙂 I couldn’t help myself. ---
**Author:** ![Xema](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/x/9de053/32.png) [@Xema](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Xema)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2012, 1:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-beds-elevated/613632/43 "2012-02-23T13:03:35Z")
Note that in Japan it’s common to sleep on a futon, which is typically unelevated. ---
**Author:** ![Pleonast](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pleonast/32/1183_2.png) [@Pleonast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pleonast)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2012, 3:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-beds-elevated/613632/44 "2012-02-23T15:33:16Z")
> [@Nava](#): > > > [@Pleonast](#): > > > > That’s a quirk of your heating system. With hypocaustic heat, the floor is warm and cozy. In Korea, most homes have hypocaustic heat and most people sleep on the floor. Bedding is folded up every morning, so space and cleanliness is not an issue. Of course, they also generally keep their homes’ floors much cleaner than most Westerners do. > > Those of us who do not have carpeting disagree with your last sentence. Well, I’m open to being corrected. Do you not wear shoes indoors, so to not track outside dirt inside? Do the bathrooms have slippers, so to not track bathroom dirt to the rest of the home? Are floors wiped with a damp cloth daily? Because that is what many Koreans do (or at least the ones I know). ---
**Author:** ![Muffin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muffin/32/4341_2.png) [@Muffin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Muffin)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2012, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-beds-elevated/613632/45 "2012-02-23T15:45:55Z")
People who have poor levitation skills use elevated beds. ---
**Author:** ![TruCelt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/trucelt/32/523_2.png) [@TruCelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TruCelt)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2012, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-beds-elevated/613632/46 "2012-02-23T15:50:08Z")
> [@Pleonast](#): > > Well, I’m open to being corrected. Do you not wear shoes indoors, so to not track outside dirt inside? Do the bathrooms have slippers, so to not track bathroom dirt to the rest of the home? Are floors wiped with a damp cloth daily? Because that is what many Koreans do (or at least the ones I know). Having grown up in the USA with a Korean best friend, I can guarantee that the Korean families definition of a “clean” floor, far exceeded that of even the most OCD American household. ---
**Author:** ![panache45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/panache45/32/64_2.png) [@panache45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panache45)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2012, 12:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-beds-elevated/613632/47 "2012-02-24T00:18:21Z")
> [@Muffin](#): > > The higher the bed, the closer you are to heaven when the time comes. Yeah, but the rest of us will have farther to go. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2012, 7:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-beds-elevated/613632/48 "2012-02-24T07:20:18Z")
> [@Pleonast](#): > > Well, I’m open to being corrected. Do you not wear shoes indoors, so to not track outside dirt inside? Do the bathrooms have slippers, so to not track bathroom dirt to the rest of the home? Are floors wiped with a damp cloth daily? Because that is what many Koreans do (or at least the ones I know). The tiled ones are washed daily, but not with a wet cloth on your knees: with a _fregona_, or mop, a wet-cloth-on-a-stick. Wood floors should not get water on them frequently; they mostly get brushed or vacuumed. And how would you be tracking “bathroom dirt” to the rest of the home? It’s tiled and gets washed almost as often as the also-tiled kitchen. I even find it strange when Americans talk about “washing the shower” - I don’t need to wash the shower because I leave it clean when I shower! ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2012, 7:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-beds-elevated/613632/49 "2012-02-24T07:26:26Z")
I’d missed the part about shoes: At Mom’s (tiled except for the living room and two of the bedrooms), we wear houseshoes (_zapatillas_). These are soft-soled and intended to be worn exclusively in the house. While she doesn’t keep houseshoes in a closet at the entrancehall (many other people do, but she just doesn’t have a convenient closet), she of course has a “shoe-cleaning rug” outside her door, which is very rough and must be used to “brush” your soles before you enter the home. And the home is a flat, so by the time you reach it you’ve already brushed your shoes on two other similar rugs and walked over several yards of tiled, washed-daily floors. In my house: three shoe-cleaning rugs at the building’s entrance before you even set foot on the stairs; another one in front of my flat; most of my flat has wood floors and if I’m shoed in the house it’s with houseshoes, although I’m more likely to wear socks or go barefoot. Both of us have guest houseshoes, as do most of the people I know. ---
**Author:** ![Muffin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muffin/32/4341_2.png) [@Muffin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Muffin)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2012, 6:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-beds-elevated/613632/50 "2012-02-24T18:41:33Z")
An elevated bed gives you something to duck and cover under when the big one drops. ---
**Author:** ![ratatoskK](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ratatoskk/32/2987_2.png) [@ratatoskK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ratatoskK)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2012, 12:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-beds-elevated/613632/51 "2012-02-25T00:06:22Z")
It reminds us of our arboreal heritage as apes sleeping in the treetops. ---
**Author:** ![carnut](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnut/32/3531_2.png) [@carnut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnut)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2012, 2:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-beds-elevated/613632/52 "2012-02-25T02:40:09Z")
Cats subliminally put the need for elevated beds into our minds so they would have a place to hide when it is time to go to the vet. ---
**Author:** ![Tamex](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ccd318/32.png) [@Tamex](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tamex)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2012, 4:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-beds-elevated/613632/53 "2012-02-25T04:43:46Z")
> [@TruCelt](#): > > Agree about reduction of the bedtime bug popluation, but I don’t see any mention of rodents. In a particularly sad interview, Carol Burnette said when she was a little girl, the thing she wanted most was a cage that she could sleep in - a cage that would keep the rats away. > > Rodents can jump, but they are far less likely to travel to a bed that is off the floor and has no food on it. A bed on the ground is just part of the pathway and they will run back and forth over it, possibly stopping to nibble a finger or toe. > > Not a problem for most of us SDMB denizens, but you asked about origins. . . I’d always heard it was because of rodents as well. It was common in the past to have infestations of pests. See the Nutcracker Suite for an example of a story that takes it for granted that even a very fancy upper-class home in the old days would be infested with mice. ---
**Author:** ![TBG](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c89c15/32.png) [@TBG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TBG)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2012, 12:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-beds-elevated/613632/54 "2012-02-27T00:57:09Z")
> [@Pleonast](#): > > Well, I’m open to being corrected. Do you not wear shoes indoors, so to not track outside dirt inside? Do the bathrooms have slippers, so to not track bathroom dirt to the rest of the home? Are floors wiped with a damp cloth daily? Because that is what many Koreans do (or at least the ones I know). Bathroom dirt?😕 ---
**Author:** ![even\_sven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/dfb087/32.png) [@even\_sven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/even_sven)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2012, 2:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-beds-elevated/613632/55 "2012-02-27T02:30:12Z")
A lot of cultures will have raised beds that allow for airflow in hot weather- like the Indian [charpoy](https://www.google.com/search?ix=seb&q=chappoy&um=1&ie=UTF-8&hl=en&tbm=isch&source=og&sa=N&tab=wi&ei=euRKT9uTFKLu0gH284jwDQ&biw=1265&bih=648&sei=feRKT-SACLCw0QG4_OCaDg#um=1&hl=en&safe=off&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=ieRKT-aOF4nz0gG9ho3yDQ&ved=0CD8QvwUoAQ&q=charpoy+bed&spell=1&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_cp.r_qf.,cf.osb&fp=6ae29da9edbd8797&biw=1265&bih=648), the West African [stick bed](http://www.flickr.com/photos/under_the_acacias/149672654/) or hammocks. Other cultures aim to retain heat. The [Chinese kang bed](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kang_bed-stove) is elevated to allow for a clever heating system that allows heat generated from cooking to heat the bed. The kang, FWIW, also serves as a sitting and dining area- truly the center of household activities. During the cold winters, it may be the only truly comfortable part of the house. Some European countries have a tradition of fully-enclosed, [cabinet style beds](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Box-bed). But plenty of people have no real need for raised beds, and are happy on mats (which, when placed on deep, clean gravel, can be quite comfortable) or futons. I think it’s really just a matter of cultural preference- is the bed going to be just for sleeping, or do people perform daily activities on it? Does it need to be portable? How many people share a sleeping space? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-are-beds-elevated/613632.md?page=2)