A Flatware Folly You Want to Avoid

When demonstrating the placement of flatware during a dining etiquette program, I am frequently asked why the cutting edge of the knife needs to face the center of the plate.

The reason for the placement of the knife blade stems back to the Middle Ages. During this time men regularly carried at least one knife. For the common man, the knife served two purposes: one as an eating utensil for spearing meat on the tip of the blade, the other for use as a dagger. For aristocratic men, they carried two knives. One knife for use as a kitchen tool for cutting meat before the feast, the second knife as a dagger carried in a sheath suspended from a belt around their waist.

In fact, have you heard the expression, “To whet your appetite?” It comes from the practice during the Middle Ages of placing a whetstone before the entrance of an eating room so men could sharpen their knifes before they would partake in a feast of food.

It is because people were keenly aware men were armed with knives at the eating table (threatening human weapons), that table manners were created for safety. A system of civilized taboos were created to reduce tension while at the same time to protect one another–“we do not want the guests to get mixed up with the dishes.” 1

This is why table manners say not to point a knife at anyone at the table, or to hold the knife standing upright in your fist, or to have the cutting edge of the knife blade face a guest. It is all based on the notion that we sit closely at a table and that we easily could be vulnerable if not for the control, order, and regularity men and women show each other through their table manners.

1 Margaret Visser, The Rituals of Dinner

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