The History and Origins of Cutlery

!: The History and Origins of Cutlery

The word cutlery originates from the cutlers who used to make iron knives. Originally from the French, who use the Latin 'Cultellus' for knife, to coin the word, this is a Middle English word for our language and can show us how cutlery does date back quite far into the past.

Cutlery has been around for many centuries. The first noted time of use around a table was around the mid 17th century when forks were the first type of cutlery to be used formally. Even though this was the first noted timed of use cutlery has been around for much, much longer. Before this though, it was not seen as as necessary, and not generally used around formal table settings.

Cutlery was actually invented 300,000 years ago by our forebearers. Early cutlery was made from flint and stone and was used for skinning and cutting through animals to make the meat easier to handle. During the iron age many types of cutlery were used and invented, because of the new technology. Cutlery then advanced further and began being made from stainless steel in the 19th century. This was to set Sheffield on the map from 1890, as the major steel producing area in England. Sheffield cutlery is prized all over the world for its quality. By now it was widely used and commonplace in every home.

Knives and variations of knives have been around for a very long time. As mentioned earlier forks are a relatively modern invention. They were brought over from Italy during the 17th century by an English traveller who saw them. At first he was ridiculed and was given the insult "furcifer" or "fork bearer". However after a while though people saw the benefits of forks, and by the mid 19th century they were being produced in masses during the industrial revolution. Forks have been used on the continent since the 11th century, and so actually came relatively late to Britain. Since their arrival though, they have obviously become very widely used, and it did not take long for us to adapt to the cutlery using way of life.

Now onto spoons. Spoons have been around since early civilization. The ancient word for spoon from the Greek and Roman was cochlea, meaning spiral shaped snail shell. In northern Europe though spoons were tended to be carved out of wood. Once again though England did not take much notice of the spoon until the mid 19th century: this was because drinking soup from bowls was thought to be very rude by then.