A placeholder for content that is rendered in a specific part of the parent component, such as the header or footer of an <apex:dataTable > and <apex:pageblocktable>. An < apex:facet > component can only exist in the body of a parent component if the parent supports facets. The name of the facet component must match one of the pre-defined facet names on the parent component. if you want to show the header, footer or caption of the table, you can use <facets> in visualforce page....
check that link may be that help full to u.
http://www.salesforce.com/us/developer/docs/pages/Content/pages_compref_facet.htm