Sofas Down Through The Ages

There has been a great many styles and kinds of sofas down through the ages. These ubiquitous pieces of household furniture have a far more ancient history than many might believe, as a matter of fact. There have been versions of a sofa as a item in a household for literally thousands and thousands of years. Today, almost no home is without this very versatile and sometimes comfortable item.

The origins of the word 'sofa' come from an Arabic word used to describe the same kind of furniture. Arabs referred to a long reclining bench as a 'suffah, ' and 17th century travelers from Europe who were roaming about the Orient and the Arabian Peninsula or Middle East, in particular, noticed that they reclined or sat on a bench that was somewhat similar.

The two words 'sofa' and 'couch' are fairly interchangeable in modern day English, though the origins of 'couch' comes from the French word 'coucher, ' which is taken to mean something related to reclining or lying down. However, the French themselves did not refer to their own version of the sofa as a 'coucher.' Rather, they called their piece of furniture a canape.

Now, that particular word in the English language is used to describe something known as a finger food and not a sofa or couch. However, English craftsmen in the 15th century to the French word for the household item that they were creating that would eventually become the sofa and applied the French term 'coucher' to it. Naturally, it eventually became shortened to the word 'couch.'

Nowadays, most people are completely unaware that the word 'sofa' has its origin among the Arab-speaking people in the Orient, though they might suspect that the word 'couch' is possibly French in its origins. Regardless, these fascinating pieces of furniture actually go back much farther into the mists of history than just the pieces of furniture the French or English were playing around with.

In fact, ancient Romans and Greeks -- all men -- have their own version of the sofa. These benches also reclined and it was there that the men in Greek and Roman society would eat their dinners and take their ease. Women were not allowed to make use of the Greek or Roman version of the sofa, though. For them, it was a chair or something similar. One can see the injustice in this.

Sofa development since the 16th century can mainly be credited to English and German craftsmen. Both looked at how to make something that people could sit on that would also be comfortable. They would construct a wooden frame and then begin to pad it with various natural materials like bird feathers. Of course, all of these materials would need to be wrapped in something durable and then covered with something attractive.

Most scholars and historians trace the development of the modern sofa to that era. In the 19th and 20th centuries, it was rare that a middle class or even lower class family did not have a sofa in their own household, and these very versatile and highly attractive pieces of furniture soon became extremely important. Ranking just behind beds, sofas probably are the second most popular piece of furniture.