Recently I was told by a friend:
People used to sleep in two shifts, one from 8pm to midnight, then wake up for an hour or two, before taking a second sleep shift from 2am to 6am.
He claims that this has been alluded to in books of the time but never directly mentioned, how many modern books do you read with the line "and I went to bed at midnight and slept for 8 hours straight as is the custom"
This story sounds credible but I am having trouble finding any evidence to support it.
