Most of the time, if we think of quilting, we think of it as beginning in Western Europe in the 17th or 18th Century. However, research in a fine paper by Kateryn de Develyn. writing on the history of quilting, talks about the very ancient practice of quilting, including several rare illustrations. Some information from her 61-page PDF format paper:

Romans used a type of quilt to sleep on (the traditional three layers of cloth, top, cover and filling), which accounts for the spread of the quilt really throughout all of Roman Britain.

Evidence of Chinese and Indian quilting came about as Buddhist monks pieced together scraps of cloth that we surmise today came from traveling pilgrims. One site is dated between the 6-9th Centuries at the Cave of 1,000 Buddhas in the Berinda region in India (along the Silk Road).

Egyptian sculptures have been discovered showing a pharoah wearing a quilted garment (@3,400 BCE) (though Cynthia is careful to point out that the garment could be woven). More directly relevant to the history of quilting is the discovery of a royal funeral canopy which is actually a quilt made of dyed gazelle skins in a variety of colors. Date 980 BCE.

That famous 14th Century shift to significantly colder weather prompted widespread use of quilts throughout Europe.
Several articles talk about the Crusaders bringing back quilts from the Near East; however, Marco Polo did go to China and quilted armour was used by Chinese, Japanese, and Islamic warriors throughout the medieval period.
Our humanities book by Gloria Fiero does cover quilting as a popular folkart, mentioning the famous Underground Railway quilts, coded to let runaway slaves know which houses were safe houses on their journey north to freedom and Canada. So, quilts have a very long history, both practical and beautiful. Sorry, no pictures. Kateryn's document has them in PDF.