Left and right

Caspar David Friedrich, Two men by the sea, 1817
Caspar David Friedrich, Two men by the sea, 1817

From ‘Bias against left-handed people’, English Wikipedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bias_against_left-handed_people

Ancient languages

Historically, the left side, and subsequently left-handedness, was considered negative. The word left itself derives from the Anglo-Saxon word lyft, ‘weak’.  In Ancient Greek both words meaning ‘left’ were euphemisms: the word ἀριστερός, aristerós (the standard word in Modern Greek as well) is derived from ἄριστος, áristos, ‘best’, and the word εὺώνυμος, euōnymos, ‘of good name’, is another euphemism used in lieu of ‘ill-named’. The Latin adjective sinister originally meant ‘left’ but took on meanings of ‘evil’ or ‘unlucky’ by the Classical Latin era, and this double meaning survives in European derivatives of Latin, and in the English word sinister. Alternatively, sinister comes from the Latin word sinus meaning ‘pocket’: a traditional Roman toga had only one pocket, located on the left side. The right hand has historically been associated with skill: the Latin word for right-handed is dexter, as in ‘dexterity’, meaning manual skill. These words continue to be used in describing the points of an escutcheon (heraldry) where the right side of a field is referred to as dexter while the left side is sinister. Even the word ambidexterity reflects the bias. Its intended meaning is “skillful on both sides”. However, since it keeps the Latin root dexter, which means ‘right’, it ends up conveying the idea of being “right-handed on both sides”. This bias is also apparent in the lesser-known antonymambisinistrous, which means ‘left-handed [i.e., clumsy] on both sides’.

In more technical contexts, sinistral may be used in place of left-handed and sinistrality in place of left-handedness. In both Ancient Greek and Roman religion, auspices (usually the flight paths of birds, as observed by a bird-diviner, or augur) were thought to be unfavorable if appearing on the diviner’s left-hand side and favorable if on the right: an ancient custom mentioned in Homer‘s Iliad and of apparently Middle Eastern origin (as attested in the Amarna correspondence, in which a king of Alashiya, i.e. Cyprus, requests an eagle-diviner from the Pharaoh of Egypt). Meanings gradually developed from use of these terms in the ancient languages.

European languages

In many modern European languages, including English, the word for the direction right also means ‘correct’ or ‘proper’, and also stands for authority and justice.

In most Slavic languages the root prav ‘right’ is used in words carrying meanings of correctness or justice. In colloquial Russian the word левый levyĭ ‘left’ means ‘unofficial, counterfeit, strange’. In Polish, the word prawo means ‘right’ as well as ‘law’; prawy means ‘lawful’; the word lewy means ‘left’ (opposite of right), and colloquially ‘illegal’ (opposite of legal). The Czech slang term levárna (roughly ‘left business’) denotes a suspicious, shady scheme or trickery.

In French, droit(e) (cognate to English direct) means both ‘right’ and ‘straight’, as well as ‘law’ and the legal sense of ‘right’, while gauche means ‘left’ and is also a synonym of maladroit, literally ‘not right’, meaning ‘clumsy’. Spanish, Italian, Portuguese and German have similar constructs. The Spanish term diestro and the Italian term destro mean both ‘right-handed’ and ‘skillful’. The contemporary Italian word sinistra has both meanings of ‘sinister’ and ‘left’ (the masculine adjective for sinister being sinistro), and maldestro means ‘clumsy’. The Spanish siniestra has both, too, although the ‘left’ meaning is less common and is usually expressed by izquierda, a Basque word that made its way into Portuguese as well. In some Spanish-speaking countries, to do something por izquierda means to engage in corrupt conduct or employ illegitimate means, whereas por derecha or a derechas means to do it the right (legitimate) way.  Also, in Spanish, to tell someone Eres tan zurdo means that they are being clumsy, though the literal meaning is ‘You’re so lefty’. In Portuguese, the most common word for left-handed person, canhoto, was once used to identify the devil, and canhestro, a related word, means ‘clumsy’.

In Vietnamese, the word for ‘right’, phải also means ‘correct’ or ‘must’. The word for ‘left’ is trái, which also means ‘wrong, opposite’. For example, mặc áo trái means ‘wearing a shirt inside out’, and làm trái ý means ‘to go against someone’s will’.

In Romanian drept/dreaptă (coming from Latin directus) means both ‘right’ and ‘straight’. The word for ‘left’ is stâng/stângă, from Latin stancus (= stanticus) meaning ‘tired’.

In German, recht means ‘right’ in both the adjectival sense (correct) and the nominal (legal entitlement). The word for ‘left’ is links, and is closely related to both link ‘underhand, questionable’, and linkisch ‘clumsy’.

The Dutch words for ‘left’ (links, linker) and ‘right’ (recht, rechts, rechter) have much the same meanings and connotations as in English. The adjective link means ‘cunning, shifty’ or ‘risky’. A linkerd is a ‘crafty devil’. To look at someone over the left shoulder (iemand over de linkerschouder aanzien) is to regard him or her as insignificant. There is also the saying to have two left hands, meaning that that person is clumsy.

In Irish, deas means ‘right side’ and ‘nice’. Ciotóg is the left hand and is related to ciotach ‘awkward’; ciotógach (kyut-OH-goch) is the term for left-handed. In Welsh, the word chwith means ‘left’, but can also mean ‘strange’, ‘awkward’, or ‘wrong’. The Scots term for left-handedness is corrie fistit. The term can be used to convey clumsiness.

In Finnish, the word oikea means both ‘right’ (okay, correct) and ‘right’ (the opposite of left).

In Swedish, vänster means ‘left’; att göra något med vänsterhanden (literally ‘to do something with your left hand’) means ‘to do something badly’. The term vänsterprassel means ‘infidelity, adultery, cheating’. From this term the verb vänstra is derived.

In Norwegian, the word keivhendt can be used as a way of saying ‘left-handed’, but the word literally translated means ‘wrong-handed’.

In Hungarian, the word for right is jobb, which also means ‘better’. The word for left is bal, which also means ‘bad’. In Estonian, the word pahem means both ‘left’ and ‘worse’ and parem means both ‘right’ and ‘better’.

In Turkish, the word for ‘right’ is sağ, which means ‘alive’. The word for left is sol, which means ‘discolor, die, ill’.

Asian languages

In Chinese culture, the adjective ‘left’ (Chinese character: 左, Mandarin: zuǒ) sometimes means ‘improper’ or ‘out of accord’. For instance, the phrase ‘left path’ (左道, zuǒdào) stands for unorthodox or immoral means.

In Korean, the word for ‘right’ is oreun (오른), to be compared to the word meaning ‘morally proper’, orheun (옳은), which shares the same pronunciation. The word for ‘left’ is oen (왼), which comes from oeda (외다), which means ‘left and right reversed, twisted(of mind)’, also ‘wrong’ in Middle Korean.

In Sanskrit, the word वाम, vama stands for both ‘left’ and ‘wicked’.

In Hebrew, as well as in other ancient Semitic and Mesopotamian languages, the term ‘left’ was a symbol of power or custody. There were also examples of left-handed assassins in the Old Testament (Ehud killing the Moabite king). The left hand symbolized the power to shame society, and was used as a metaphor for misfortune, natural evil, or punishment from the gods. This metaphor survived ancient culture and was integrated into mainstream Christianity by early Catholic theologians, such as Ambrose of Milan, to modern Protestant theologians, such as Karl Barth, to attribute natural evil to God in explaining God’s omnipotence over the universe.

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