Expression "hand over fist" -- A History Channel folk etymology?

Cohen, Gerald Leonard gcohen at MST.EDU
Wed Feb 18 02:08:48 UTC 2009


This is now my fourth attempt to send this message ------

    A colleague told me about hearing the origin of the expression "(making money) hand over fist" on the History Channel, and I asked him if he could e-mail me the information as best he remembered it.  Below my signoff is what he sent (Many thanks).

     First, though, I checked OED online and tried to include its "hand over fist" attestations in this ads-l message, but the ads-l website is configured to reject such inclusions. So I'll just retype the earliest two entries (which aren't all that early and don't refer to the making of money):

1825: W.N. GLASCOCK, _Naval Sketch-Bk. (1826) I.26 The French..weathered our wake, coming up with us, 'hand over fist', in three divisions.
1833 S. SMITH _Life Major J. Downing_ (1834) 116 They..clawed the money off of his table, hand over fist.

    Might the original context have been a furious climbing motion (perhaps in an attack), with one hand grasping onto the rung of a ladder while the other hand reaches up to the next rung?  Then by extension, the clawing of money off the gambling table (one hand over the other, raking it all in) and hence: "making money hand over fist"?

Gerald Cohen

[from my colleague about History Channel program]:

<snip>

"The matter as I understand it...the phrase refers to the process by which money is made, in this sense it is equivalent to the more modern expression of 'printing money', both simply references to the manufacturing process.  At one stage in the history of money it was made by first creating a flat sheet of a precious metal at a given thickness.  Then, much like using a cookie punch on cookie dough, one uses a cylindrical tool to stamp out round discs, the excess metal left over from the punches can then be re-melted in the next batch, so all the metal is preserved.  After the metal is cut into a disc a mallet and printing device are then used to stamp both sides of the coin.  The stamp is held in a fist like grip, the mallet is held in the hand and thus when you put your hand over your fist you are literally making money in this setting."

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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org



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