Handshake (pronounced hand-sheyk)
(1) A gripping and shaking of (traditionally the right) hands by two
individuals, as to symbolize greeting, congratulation, agreement or farewell.
(2) In digital communication, as handshaking, an exchange
of predetermined signals between a computer and a peripheral device or another
computer, made when a connection is initially established or at intervals
during data transmission, in order to assure proper synchronization.
1801: The construct was hand + shake. Hand was from the Middle English hond & hand, from the Old English hand,
from the Proto-West Germanic handu,
from the Proto-Germanic handuz (and
related to the Dutch, Norwegian Nynorsk & Swedish hand, the Danish hånd, the German Hand and the West Frisian hân)
of uncertain origin although there may be a link to the Old Swedish hinna (to gain), the Gothic fra-hinþan (to take captive, capture),
the Latvian sīts (hunting spear), the
Ancient Greek κεντέω (kentéō) (prick)
and the Albanian çandër (pitchfork; prop). Shake was from the Middle English schaken, from the Old English sċeacan & sċacan (to shake), from the Proto-West Germanic skakan, from the Proto-Germanic skakaną (to shake, swing, escape), from the
primitive Indo-European skeg-, keg-, skek- & kek- (to
jump, move). It was cognate with the Scots
schake & schack (to shake), the West Frisian schaekje (to shake), the Dutch schaken
(to elope, make clean, shake), the Low German schaken (to move, shift, push, shake) & schacken (to shake, shock), the Old Norse skaka (to shake), the Norwegian Nynorsk skaka (to shake), the Swedish skaka
(to shake), the Danish skage (to
shake), the Dutch schokken (to shake,
shock) and the Russian скака́ть (skakátʹ) (to jump”). The present participle is handshaking
and the familiar past participle handshaked but some dictionaries still list
the rare handshook as an alternative; the noun plural is handshakes.
The handshake not a universal cultural practice (the
Japanese famously favor the bow although in recent decades it’s executed often
as more of a nod) but, in one form or another, it is global and involves
usually two people grasping hands and moving them in a brief, up-and-down
movement. The right hand tends to be
favored (left-handers sinister obviously) and this has been linked to the symbolism of that being the usual
choice when wielding a weapon but that is speculative and the global
preponderance of right-handedness may be of greater significance. Quite when the handshake became a cultural
practice isn’t known but it is certainly ancient, at least among those
important enough to be depicted in forms of art because the oldest
representations date back more than the-thousand years.
Some handshakes promised much; results were varied. Clockwise from top left: Mao Tse-tung & Richard Nixon (1972), Yitzhak Rabin & Yasser Arafat (1993), Mikhail Gorbachev & Ronald Reagan (1985), Donald Trump & crooked Hillary Clinton (2016), Martin McGuinness & Queen Elizabeth II (2012) and Nelson Mandela & FW de Klerk (1994).
Handshake (hand-shake) is a surprisingly modern construction, dating only from 1801 and "hand-shaking" is attested from 1805; the phrases “to shake hands” & “shaking hands” have been in use since the sixteenth century and the use of the noun “grip” to mean "a handshake" (especially one of a secret society) dates from 1785. Secret handshakes are created so members of clubs and societies may make their affiliation known to another person without needing to use words. For a secret handshake to be effective it must be specific enough to be recognized by another member yet subtle enough that a non-member would not find the nature of the grip strange or unusual. Because of the limited possibilities offered by fingers and thumbs, some secret handshakes involve also actions such as using the other hand to touch an earlobe in a certain way or a tapping a foot. The concept has been documented since Antiquity and is most famously associated with the Freemasons but to speak of the “secret Masonic handshake” is misleading, some researchers claiming there are at least sixteen distinctly identifiable Masonic handshakes and most have speculated there will be dozens more. Indeed, except in the early years, Freemasonry has never been monolithic and there are known cases of one faction (even within a lodge) developing their own so that they might discuss matter freely without the risk they may be spilling secrets to the other faction. The mechanics of the secret handshakes used by members of the Secret Society of the Les Clefs d’Or are not known.
The golden handshake is a clause in executive employment
contracts that provides for a generous severance package in certain circumstances. Created originally as a relatively modest inducement
to attract staff to companies in a perilous financial position, they evolved to
the point where multi-million dollar pay-outs were common and they became controversial
because they appeared to reward failure and there were suggestions (not only by
conspiracy theorists) they were used even as Trojan horses to entice a CEO to
drive down a company’s share price (thus becoming eligible for a golden handshake)
in the interest of asset strippers and others.
The best operators were able to engineer things so they enjoyed both a
golden handshake and a golden parachute (the generous package payable upon
retirement in the normal course of things).
In computer communications, a handshake is a signal exchanged
between two or more devices or programs to confirm authentication and
connection. In the same way that the
human handshake is a process: (1) an offer of a hand, (2) the taking of that
hand and (3) the shaking of the hands, in computing, the sequence is (1) seeking
a connection, (2) verifying the connection and (3) effecting the
connection. The breaking of the
handshake and the termination of the connection in each case constitutes the
final, fourth setup. The purpose of handshaking
is to establish the parameters for the duration of the session which involves
the devices agreeing on vital stuff like (1) both being switched on, (2) both
ready to transmit & receive and (3) that certain technical protocols will
be used (familiar to many as famous strings like “9600,N,8,1”). Handshaking historically was a process separate
from the security layers which had to be satisfied once communication was established
and again, this is analogous with the handshake in the process of human
interaction.
As a cultural practice with a history known to date back at least ten thousand years, the handshake has proven a resilient tradition which has survived the vicissitudes of many millennia and even the preference of elbow-bumping and such during the Covid-19 pandemic seems only to have been a minor interruption. Not all however approved. The Duce (Benito Mussolini, 1883–1945; prime minister and Duce (leader) of Italy 1922-1943) thought handshaking effete and unhygienic (he was ready for pandemics) and preferred the fascist salute he thought (apparently on the basis of statues from Ancient Rome) more martial. He certainly had plans to make Italy great again (MIGA) and men shaking hands with each other had to go; the Duce had expressed his disgust at the decadence of the modern Italian people, believing they had been seduced by French ways into “elevating cooking to the status of high art”, declaring he would never allow Italy to descend to the level of France, a country ruined by “alcohol, syphilis and journalism”. Still, when meeting friends (even those forced on him by the brutishness of political necessity) he shook hands and a handshake was both his first and last interaction with the Führer (Adolf Hitler, 1889-1945; German head of government 1933-1945 and of state 1934-1945). Their smiles when shaking hands always seemed genuine and conspicuously were warm when they parted after the attempt on Hitler’s life in July 1944. Within a year, both would be dead.
One historian entitled his work on the relationship between Hitler and Mussolini The Brutal Friendship and that it was but it was certainly enduring and as he promised in 1938 when Rome proved helpful during the Nazi's annexation of Austria, "no matter what", the Führer stuck with the Duce through "thick and thin". They shook hands on many occasions, the last of which would happen on the railway station platform close to where the attempt on the Führer's life failed. At this time, Hitler was using his left hand to shake, the right arm injured in the blast. After this, they would never meet again.
For politicians, handshakes are a wonderful photo opportunity
and some have been famously emblematic of the resolution of problems which have
been intractable for decades or more.
However, such photographs can be unpleasant and sometimes embarrassing
reminders of a past they’d prefer was forgotten. When Donald Rumsfeld (1932–2021; US secretary
of defense 1975-1977 & 2001-2006) shook hands with Saddam Hussein
(1937–2006; president of Iraq 1979-2003) in Baghdad in December 1983, it was as a presidential
envoy of Ronald Reagan (1911–2004; president of the US 1981-1989) and he was
there to do business with the dictator. Iraq
at the time had started a war with Iran and was using chemical weapons
while practicing abuses of human rights on parts of the Iraqi population and Saddam
Hussein had even made known to the US administration Baghdad’s intention to
acquire nuclear weapons. Thus was special
envoy Rumsfeld dispatched to offer Washington’s hand of friendship, anybody
opposed to the Ayatollahs held in high regard in Washington DC.
Despite what Mr Rumsfeld would claim twenty years on, he made no mention of chemical weapons or human rights abuses, his discussions instead focusing on the projection of US military force in the Gulf and the need to guarantee and protect the supply of oil. Later, as international pressure increased on the US to condemn the use of chemical weapons by Iraq it responded with a low-key statement which made no mention of Iraq and actually stressed the need to protect Iraq from Iran’s “ruthless and inhumane tactics”. When Mr Rumsfeld returned to Baghdad in 1984, during the visit the United Nations (UN) issued a report which stated chemical weapons had been used against Iran, something already known to both the Pentagon and state department. In Baghdad, the matter wasn’t mentioned and when Mr Rumsfeld departed, it was with another warm handshake. That's not a criticism or Mr Rumsfeld; it's just the way politics is done.
By virtue of her education in a Roman Catholic school, Nancy Pelosi (b 1940; speaker of the US House of Representatives 2007-2011 and since 2019, member of the house since 1987) was well acquainted with the Bible so after shaking hands with Bashar al-Assad (b 1965, President of Syria since 2000) in April 2007, to use the phrase “The road to Damascus is a road to peace” must have been a deliberate choice. It might also be thought a curious choice given that at the time the president was providing shelter and protection to a range of terrorist groups involved in attacking US forces in Iraq. As speaker of the house, Ms Pelosi would have received high-level intelligence briefings so presumably was acquainted with the facts and had she been uncertain, could have had aides prepare a summary from publicly available sources. As recent events in the Far East have illustrated, the speaker’s forays into foreign affairs are not always a help to the State Department.
In cultural anthropology, greetings like handshakes, high fives, fist bumps and such are classed as “gesture-based greetings” or “physical greetings” and while there’s much cross-cultural overlap, some cam be specific. As social gestures used variously to convey to greeting, respect, acknowledgment, agreement, celebration etc, they can be exclusively non-verbal or combined with either an ad-hoc or structured use of text or even an ancillary gesture such as the handshake plus bow combo or the salute plus a “clicking of the heels” (a sharp, audible snap of the heels together when coming to attention), In popular culture, representations of the latter have made it much much associated with nineteenth & twentieth century German military tradition but it was not exclusively Prussian in origin or use. Historians do however believe it was the Königlich Preußische Armee (Royal Prussian Army (1701–1919)) which institutionalized the practice as a part of formal drilling and from there it became part of everyday military life. The joke in Europe was that “while most countries had an army, the Prussian army had a country”, and the practice widely was adopted by civilians although whether this was because the army was so admired or simply soldiers “taking it with them” even when not on duty isn’t documented. It can though be said that following the unification of Germany in 1871 (essentially a Prussian takeover), the army’s traditions effectively were nationalized and military-style drills (including the heel click) were integrated into the education system. During the Third Reich (1939-1945) the practice became exaggerated for dramatic effect, yet another aspect of the regime’s focus on spectacle.
Adolf Hitler (1889-1945; Führer (leader) and German head of government 1933-1945 & head of state 1934-1945, left) training Rudolf Hess (1894–1987; Nazi Deputy Führer 1933-1941, right) in party etiquette, opening of the Nuremberg Party Congress, September, 1938.
There are many “body language greetings” and in the Western tradition they include (1) the handshake (used in both formal or informal settings to convey various sentiments), (2) the high five (a celebratory or friendly gesture popular in many sub-cultures) and (3) the fist bump (which was once an inherently informal practice in among the “cool” but may have been devalued when in 2022 footage appeared of Joe Biden (b 1942; US president 2021-2025) offering one to Saudi Arabia’s de-facto leader Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman Al Saud (b 1985 and referred to colloquially as MBS), the problem being if Mr Biden did something it ceased to be “cool” and became associated with cognitive decline. The elbow bump was recommended during the Covid-19 pandemic as a hygienic alternative to the handshake but never caught on because (1) the recommendation came from the same governments which were subjecting people to lock-downs, (2) it seemed a silly thing to do given the alternative (saying “hello”) solved the problem; if a gesture was thought necessary, a wave worked well. Post-pandemic, hugs made a comeback although in the #metoo era many avoid them and men greeting women have started to use something between a respectful nod and a slight bow, a technique with some history because the conventions for shaking hands with women never became as standardized as was the long established practice between men. The bow of course is highly cross-cultural and in the upper reaches of Western culture it can be obligatory for men to bow to certain individuals. In East Asia, the bow remains in many circles a social convention but even in highly ritualistic Japan use has declined among the general population although the action, sometimes in an exaggerated form, remains a vital part of the “public apology” process when a politician, businessman, entertainer etc is compelled to “say sorry” for some transgression or loss of face.
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