When the fork was designed, was it with the intention of having food pushed onto the back of it, or the other way round like a shovel?
by 
anonymous
ANSWERS: 4
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Depends where you come from, A Brit for instance believes it to be a stabbing instrument but Americans seem to use it as a sort of leaky spoon.
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It was designed to spear things with, that's why they have pointed ends to the tines.
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Forks were originally only two tines and the tines were completrely straight, no curve for holding food on it. It was for serving by spearing. Then it was used for eating but not for scooping. They either used it to hold it still so it could be cut into a smaller piece, away from a big piece of something, or it was used to spear and shake the juice off it. People still ate with their hands a lot. Societies that already had food the correct size for eating didn't use forks, no reason to. THey stuck with chopsticks and spoons.
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For both uses interchangeably, as according to table etiquette you can shovel if you hold the fork in the other hand and dispense with the knife. I would say also it was designed for spearing something so the knife could cut it, that is its probable primary design, probably etiquette came along and if you were "proper" you would then push the food on as shovelling would have been seen, and still is as slubbonly. However I had this issue with my father for four years, and at the end of it I still maintained it was a shovelling and prodding tool, rather than a "push on the back tool" which is fiddly and impractical for many foods. There are sporks available which are a cross between a fork and a spoon which is suitable for those that prefer shovelling.
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