Nine Section Tray

This is a partitioned side-dish container for serving court cuisine, and is also called ‘nine-section wheat cake,’ since thin, round wheat crepes would be piled up in the middle section and eaten by wrapping food from the other partitions. Its name came from its form, in which an octagonal wooden plate is divided into nine compartments. This nine-section tray was originally made of wood, whereas today it is made of ceramics, glass, plastics, or silver. The wooden variant is varnished with lacquer and elaborately inlaid with various motifs using mother-of-pearl. The nine-section tray is also used for refreshments served with liquor or tea. On occasions for drinking liquor, a nine-section tray would be used to serve dry snacks including dates, pine nuts, peanuts and dried persimmons, while, to accompany tea, it would be used to serve colorful arrangements of assorted deep-fried sweet rice cakes (gangjeong) and pressed sweets (dasik). These nine-section trays are referred to a dry nine-section tray. The upper class also used a nine-section tray for seasonal dishes on the 15th of lunar June, a day in traditional mythology when ancestors would wash their hair in water flowing toward the east. In this usage, the number nine in the nine-section tray signifies a perfect ideal. It was believed at the time that the universe was divided into nine heavens, which was thought to be why the Korean Peninsula is divided into the eight provinces and Seoul. The nine-section tray is a kind of lidded dish whose plate is divided into nine sections to carry different dishes, and comprised an octagonal body, lid and foot. The center partition is octagonal in shape, and the surrounding eight sections are interlocked around it. The lacquered octagonal lid is inlaid with mother-of-pearl motifs, including a pear blossom in the center surrounded by Rose of Sharon patterns, and eight butterflies on the edges. As for its foot, eight brims are attached to the eight edges in the shape of an octagon and all sides except the edges of the lid are lacquered in yellowish red.