How can I vertically align a <table> in the middle of a fixed height <div>?

Why does the code below not cause the <table> to be vertically-aligned in the middle of the <div>?

<div style="width: 850px; height: 470px;vertical-align: middle;" align="center">
        <table style="padding-left: 20px; width: 700px; border: 10px groove #0033CC; background-color: #F9F9F9;">
            <tr>
                <td>
                    &nbsp;
                </td>
                <td>
                    &nbsp;
                </td>
                <td>
                    &nbsp;
                </td>
            </tr>            <tr>
                <td>
                    &nbsp;
                </td>
                <td>
                    &nbsp;
                </td>
                <td>
                    &nbsp;
                </td>
            </tr>
            <tr>
                <td>
                    &nbsp;
                </td>
                <td>
                    &nbsp;
                </td>
                <td>
                    &nbsp;
                </td>
            </tr>
        </table>
    </div>

I want the <table> in the middle of the <div>, but it is at the top! How can I fix this?

Thanks for your future advice.

Solution

Outside of table cells, vertical-align sets the vertical alignment of text within a line, rather than the vertical alignment of entire elements like your table.

However, if you set display: table-cell; on your <div>, that seems to achieve the effect you want.

I’m not sure how many browsers support this though. I’ve checked in Chrome 6, Firefox 2 and Opera 10.5, and they’re fine with it. Internet Explorer could be a different matter.