Probably, the first man’s table utensils were sea and coconut shells. But those didn’t suit cooking, so the man learned to make clay vessels and to fire them. Such was the beginning, but it took seven thousand years more, before ceramics became traditional serveware material.
Plates appeared rather later than regular knifes and spoons. In VIII century at kings’ courts they served food in hollows carved in wooden dinner tables, in XIII century aristocrats took food with their three fingers from silver platters and put it on round-shaped toasts, and only in XIV-XV centuries wooden and tin plates came into use.
All regular plates, used today for laying the table, are divided into shallow and deep. Deep 10 inches plates are used for serving hot or chilled soups (schi, borsch, okroshka). Clear soups are served in bouillon cups.
Smaller plates are quite diverse. There are 10 inch table plates for main and hot dishes, 8 inch salad or cold appetizer plates, 7 inch patty plates (for serving bread, buns, sandwiches or toasts). Salad plates are also suitable for serving desserts for fresh or canned fruits and puddings.
The choice of plates depends on the menu. For breakfast usually one salad plate is used. The serving for dinner and evening meals is more complex — two or three plates are used, placed one upon another while reducing in diameter, plus a deep plate, which is placed on the table after starters are eaten. The plate is placed right behind the proper chair’s back, so as the nearest plate’s edge comes not closer than 1 inch from the table’s edge.
Patty plates are standard serving element of European table, but they are rarely used in Russia, just at official parties in restaurants and on banquets. Patty plate is placed 2-6 inches on the left from main plates. Often they put butter knife on it.
Speaking about personal plates, I would mention such exotic utensil as slop-basin for fingers. It is used when there are dishes in the menu, that have to be eaten with bare hands. Such a basin could be presented by German silver, glass, silver bowls, they are half-filled with water with a lemon slice added for better fat removing. The basin is placed on the left from main utensils, moving a patty plate a little up.
