bedspread, top cover of a bed, put on for tidiness or display rather than warmth. Use of a bedspread is an extremely ancient custom, referred to in the earliest written sources, for example, the Bible: “I have decked my bed with coverings of tapestry” (Proverbs 7:16). The first bedcovers were probably of fur. Later versions included every sort of refinement that weaving or embroidery could produce. The Roman historian Livy wrote in the 1st century bc that luxury, including “valuable bed covers,” was first brought to Rome by the armies of Asia. An English account of 1472 makes reference to a “counterpane cloth of gold furred with ermine,” and there are many similar descriptions of bed coverings in medieval inventories.
The kind of bedspread called counterpane, from the old French word contrepoinct, meaning “stitched quilt,” was probably made of patched or applied pieces, quilted together. The quilts, or quilted bedspreads, in both appliqué and patchwork, that were made in the United States during the 18th and 19th centuries have come to be considered an important type of American folk art. The colourful stylized or geometric patterns that were used were identified by imaginative, evocative names like Duck’s Foot in the Mud, Robbing Peter to Pay Paul, Missouri Puzzle, Broken Dishes, or Delectable Mountains. Each pattern has a story about its origin in symbolism. See also quilting.