In Western civilization, has it always been common practice for a married couple to share a bed?

by enjambd

I'm reading the 1892 short story "The Yellow Wallpaper" and the narrator refers to her and her husband sleeping in different beds.

He said there was only one window and not room for two beds, and no near room for him if he took another.

Was this a common thing until recently? or did it have to do with Victorian morality?

PurloinedPages

It has nothing to do with Victorian "morality," which is almost entirely mythic. (Start reading Matthew Sweet's Inventing the Victorians and continue reading the related literature.)

Generally, however, Victorian husband and wife shared a bed unless the wife was pregnant (which had nothing to do with morality, and everything to do with the perceived health of the baby), or unless their relationship had deteriorated to the point where they could no longer stand each other (like many modern couples). I don't have a specific source for this, but it's intensely common in all of the fiction of the era.

So, without having read "The Yellow Wallpaper," either their relationship has deteriorated or the wife is pregnant. This is an fairly uncommon state of being.