KNIVES AND FORKS.

Kaikoura Star, Volume LXIV, Issue 61, 7 August 1944, Page 4

KNIVES AND FORKS.

WHAT BE THEY ? Sledge: Forks! What be they! Meecroft: The laudable use of forks, brought into custom here as they are in Italy to the sparing of napkins. “The Devil is an Ass,” by Ben Jonson. * We always speak of “Knives and Forks, never of “Forks and Knives,” and yet in polite society it is the fork with which we are on the more intimate terms. The reason is, probably, that the knife existed long before the fork mad z ; its appearance and that the first ‘ ‘ forks ’ ’ were really knives. . .

Chaucer’s Prioresse who 4 4 leet no morsel from hir lippes fall” knew neither knife nor fork. She dipped into the dish with her dainty fingers and demurely conveyed the morsel to her mouth with the sanse implements. In a book on continental travel published in London in the year 1611 we read this: “The reason for this their curiosity (i.e.. the use of the fork) is because the Italian cannot by any means endure to have his dish touched with lingers seeing all men’s are not alike <dean.” Thus the fork appears to have succeeded the napkin for this particular usage. The origin of the fork was probably a smaller pointed knife with which the joint was steadied whilst being carved. From that was evolved something like a skewer or one-pronged fork which later became the two-pronged fork. But these were only servers.

Individual knives probably came into polite use in this country about the 14th century, but the individual fork in association with the knife did not put in an appearance until the 17th century, though they had been in use in Italy at a much earlier date. In fact

in some examples of early table cutlery which have been preserved we find sets of knives— with only one fork. English silver-handled knives and forks (two-pronged) of the 18th century show considerable variety and artistry of design, but as the fork developed from the two-prong to the three, and later to the four-pronged, and increased in utility, table cutlery tended to deteriorate iu design. It has been left to the silversmiths of to-day to revive the combination of beauty and usefulness.