This is the book on the way we eat Solidifying her standing as a preeminent observer & scholar of everyday life Margaret Visser takes on the sweeping history of table manners from the civilizations of ancient Greece & medieval Europe to the way that technology has altered & continues to alter our behaviour over dinner She writes of everything from cultural idiosyncrasies around preparation & consumption to the surprising origins of tableware
- forks took eight centuries to become common utensils the plate began as a four-day-old slice of bread Blending folklore history & humour this is a feast of fact & observation on one of our most primal rituals the meal