Originally Posted by Rose_P

A lot of non-quilters confuse patchwork with quilting, but at least they get that it's sewn cloth of some sort, and that's a bit better than calling a quilt a "blanket". Another issue I have on the subject is that quite a few people seem to think quilting was invented in America, and that needs to be corrected because they were around long before the discovery of the New World. The Wikipedia article on "Quilt" includes some information on the history with documentation and pictures. I learned from a dictionary that the word "quilt" comes from the Latin word for mattress. I imagine that people first started tying or sewing layers of cloth together so that they could sleep on them without having them rumple up into an uncomfortable mess. Like a whole lot of technology, it has evolved over many generations and hundreds of years. Words are defined by the way they are most clearly understood. My most strenuous objection is when someone calls a crocheted afghan a "quilt" - a total confusion of terms.