I love to quilt so much and it’s my passion. It started me thinking about just how long has quilting been around? I did some digging around and found a wonderful book by Schnuppe Von Gwinner called The History of the Patchwork Quilt: Origins, Traditions and Symbols of Textile Art. From it I learned some fascinating trivia about quilts.

According to Gwinner, the first known quilt was used by an Egyptian Queen and was made from gazelle leather that had been dyed. This quilt dates back to 980 B.C. !

Then in 5 BC there is documentation that Central Asia had saddle blanket quilts that were used in graves. According to Gwinner these quilts were made from leathers and furs and the permafrost preserved them to later be found by archeologists.

I found this interesting because if I had to guess, I would have placed the first quilts to the Colonial or Pioneer days. Perhaps I would have placed it a little earlier than that time period but not as far back as the B.C. period. So if anyone is curious about quilt, you now have a fun piece of trivia that you can share with them.