Thursday, December 8, 2011
Oldest mattress: 77000 year-old bed sets world record
DURBAN, South Africa -- An international team of archaeologists discovered a 77,000 year old bedding made of insect-repelling leaves and other medicinal plants in a South African cave - which sets the world record for the Oldest mattress, according to World Record Academy (www.worldrecordacademy.com).
Photo: Researcher Christopher Miller samples sediments containing the ancient mattresses. Photo courtesy: Prof. Lyn Wadley (enlarge photo)
The Guinness world record for the largest human mattress dominoes was achieved by 526 participants during an event organised by Tuco Meubles - Comercial Luna (Spain), in Huesca.
Guinness World Records also recognized the world record for the Oldest wooden building, set by The Horyu-ji temple in Ikaruga, Nara Prefecture, Japan, which was constructed 607 AD.
An international team of archaeologists discovered the stack of ancient beds at Sibudu, a cave in a sandstone cliff in South Africa. They consist of compacted stems and leaves of sedges, rushes and grasses stacked in at least 15 layers within a chunk of sediment 10 feet (3 meters) thick.
The World's oldest known bedding — sleeping mats made of mosquito-repellant evergreens that are about 77,000 years old — has been discovered in a South African cave.
Lyn Wadley of Johannesburg's University of the Witwatersrand, who led an international team of researchers, said mats believed used for bedding and work surfaces fit other findings that show modern man evolved in Africa.
Her fossilized evidence was found at an ancient cliff shelter known as Sibudu, near the western South African city of Durban, where Wadley has been working since 1998.
This use of medicinal plants, along with other artifacts at the cave, helps reveal how creative these early peoples were, researchers said.
"The inhabitants would have collected the sedges and rushes from along the uThongathi River, located directly below the site, and laid the plants on the floor of the shelter,"said researcher Lyn Wadley, an archaeologist at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa.
This fine covering of leaves may also represent the earliest known use of medicinal plants by humans. The leaves are from the tree Cryptocarya woodii, or river wild-quince, a medicinal plant that produces insect-killing chemicals.
Related world records:
Most people simultaneously on a bed - NakedSleep.com
Biggest Bed Jump-world record set by InterContinental Hotels Group
Largest Human Mattress Dominoes - Palantine Beds
Most Expensive Bed: The Baldacchino Supreme
Thursday, December 8, 2011 |
