“Fingers were made before forks.”（叉子出现前，用手抓饭吃）—When a person gives up good manners, puts aside knife and fork, and dives into his food, someone is likely to repeat that saying.
The fork was used as an ancient agricultural tool, （古代农业用具）but for centuries no one thought of eating with it. Not until the eleventh century, when a young lady from Constantinople（君士坦丁堡） brought her fork to Italy, did the custom reach Europe.
By the fifteenth century the use of the fork had been wide-spread in Italy. The English explanation （解释）was that the Italians don’t like eating food touched with fingers, “seeing all men’s fingers are not alike clean”. English travelers kept their friends in stitches while describing this ridiculous （可笑的）Italian custom.
Anyone who used a fork to eat with was laughed at in England for the next hundred years. Men who used forks were thought to be sissies, and women who used them were called show-offs and overnice. Not until the late 1600’s did using a fork become a common custom.
