Tick mattress

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A tick mattress, bed tick or tick is a large bag made of strong, stiff, tightly-woven material^[1] (ticking). This is then filled to make a mattress, with material such as straw, chaff, horsehair, coarse wool or down feathers,^{[2]: 674–5 vol1} and less commonly, leaves, grass, reeds, bracken, or seaweed.^[3] The whole stuffed mattress may also, more loosely, be called a tick. The tick mattress may then be sewn through to hold the filling in place, or the unsecured filling could be shaken and smoothed as the beds were aired each morning.^[4] A straw-filled bed tick is called a paillasse, palliasse, or pallet, and these terms may also be used for bed ticks with other fillings. A tick filled with flock (loose, unspun fibers, traditionally of cotton or wool) is called a flockbed. A feather-filled tick is called a featherbed, and a down-filled one is a downbed; these can also be used above the sleeper as a duvet.^[4][5]

A tick mattress (or a pile of such tick mattresses, softest topmost sheets, bedcovers, and pillows) was what Europeans traditionally called a "bed". The bedframe, when present, supported the bed but was not considered part of it.^{[2]: 674–5 vol1}