It's all in the wrist....

[Raymond A. Brown]

At 14:10 23/1/98, Harding, George E. wrote:
>Don wrote:
>
>>Well, supposedly [the negative aspects of left-
>>handedness] came from the fact that left-handed
>>people could more easily conceal weapons--the
>>guard would shake your hand, your right hand, to
>>dislodge a concealed dagger, but if you had it in
>>your left sleeve it wouldn't fall out.
>
>Correct, in ancient Rome (and before?) greeters would grasp each other's
>right forearm to check (originally) for weapons.

I checked today how the Romans actually did use the adjective 'sinister'.
As well as "left(handed)", it was also meant AUSPICIOUS, i.e. a positively
good meaning!

It seems - I once knew this, in fact, and had forgotten it - that the
Romans faced south towards the meridian when examining the sky & flight of
birds &c., i.e. practicing augury. That puts the east on your left-hand
side; this is where the sun rises, the region of (new) life & light &c.,
i.e. the auspicious side. The west, to the right, leads to the region of
death, the setting of life - not an auspicious region.

Just to make things a little complicated, however, 'sinister' sometimes did
have the opposite meaning, i.e. "inauspicious". Apparently the Greeks
faced north when they practiced augury and some Romans, following the Greek
system, associated 'left' with the inauspicious west.

The medievals, of course, no longer too auspices. But the cardinal points
were certainly of symbolic value, cf. the practice of orientating churches
in a east-west direction with the main alter at the east & the baptismal
font at the west, the practice of reading the first scripture passage (from
the NT epistles or OT prophets) from the north side of the altar & the
second passage from the Gospels on the south side, the region of light.

Medieval maps are always drawn with the east at the top. The left is thus
the dark, sinister north, while the right is the light & sunny south.

The words sinister & dexter were (& still are) used in heraldry to denote
the left & right sides of a shield from the bearer's point of view; so the
'weapon concealing' left might well have added extra weight to the sinister
association of the left.

> However, I think the
>reason for left-handedness becoming "sinister" is that it was something that
>made the individual "different" from the other members, i.e., usually vast
>majority, of the group (clan, tribe -> society), and anything different
>amongst potentially superstitious people....

I somehow doubt this since 'sinister' did not survive the Roman period as
the normal word for 'left'; the word 'sinister' was a learned word and
therefore less likely to be used among the potentially superstitious.
Where the vernacular words for 'left' develop another meaning, the meanning
is usually something like 'awkward', 'clumsy', cf. French "gauche", rather
than 'inauspicious'

Ray.

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Written in Net English Humor not marked
No intentional misreprsentation of another's statements
No intentional ad_hominem remarks

Gerasko d'aei polla didaskomenos (SOLON)
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