- This topic has 3 voices and 4 replies.
-
Posts
-
An interesting story linked to on Drudge today discussed whether people really need a single, 8-hour block of sleep. The article briefly discusses a book, which in turn talks about how up until the Enlightenment period, people typically slept in two blocks (a shorter one and a longer one), and evidence is scattered through history to show this.
In 2001, historian Roger Ekirch of Virginia Tech published a seminal paper, drawn from 16 years of research, revealing a wealth of historical evidence that humans used to sleep in two distinct chunks.His book At Day's Close: Night in Times Past, published four years later, unearths more than 500 references to a segmented sleeping pattern - in diaries, court records, medical books and literature, from Homer's Odyssey to an anthropological account of modern tribes in Nigeria.Much like the experience of Wehr's subjects, these references describe a first sleep which began about two hours after dusk, followed by waking period of one or two hours and then a second sleep.
I imagine that sleep cycles are one of those things in history that is probably overlooked quite frequently, but they could have played an important role in the way civilizations operated. Tell me - in your studies of pre-Enlightenment history, have you come across references to people doing multiple sleep cycles?
Only vaguely but nothing concrete that I recall. Is this part of the ancients did it so we should too fad? The ancients fed Christians to lions also, does that mean it was a good thing?
Is this part of the ancients did it so we should too fad?
I'm kind of surprised at your comment. If the ancients did it, and it was right, then yes we should do it too. The ancient Greek diet was and still is one of the healthiest. I'm all onboard with that, even if it's just a fad.
I am just saying we should pick and choose and make use of current scientific knowledge. This sounds like it is right up there with the paleo diet. Yes cavemen were skinny, they also died in their 30's so I don't necessarily think we should all eat raw meat and roots and berries.
I was actually bringing this up simply because I thought it was interesting from an historical perspective – not that we in the modern age should follow it. If we know this to be a fact among Europeans up until a few hundred years ago, it might help to explain other things that we read about in history that don't otherwise seem to make sense. Just something to keep in mind while studying pre-Enlightenment history.
I was just asking if it was part of the fad because that seems to be used as a selling point for a lot of different things these days. If I had a dime for every time I saw an add that claimed the product or technique was centuries old and therefor for some reason better I could buy myself a new summer house.
