The History of the making of Furniture is inexorably tied to the development and decline of the successive civilisations which have given the punctuation to the story of man's emergance in a settled society. In tracing the development of the Trade Unions in the furniture industry it is necessary to provide as a postscript a brief summary of furniture making through the ages, and its development in the United Kingdom. Of necessity this history is not exhaustive, and must needs take a partial view, but it is included in the main work to set the scene for the emergance of the workers organisations in the middle of the Victorian era.