The dishes and kitchen utensils that have been found in genizot testify to the special importance that their owners attached to these objects. In Judaism, great attention is paid to ritual purity, which also applies to utensils. While Seder plates and bottles of wine for blessing do not require genizah, objects that may have served these festive purposes were placed in synagogue attics. This may have been influenced by the non-Jewish practice of concealing items, in particular shoes and metal objects, in the fabric of buildings as a supposedly magical form of protection.
