(stress var.), a.
1. Wielded with both hands, as a sword, etc. (= prec. 1); involving the use of both hands.
1432–50. trans. Higden (Rolls), VII. 243. Taileler … toke a too honded swerde, and … did slee oon of Ynglishe men.
1588. Reg. Privy Council Scot., IV. 277. With hagbute, bow, speir, or twa-handit swerd.
1637. Milton, Lycidas, 130. That two-handed engine … Stands ready to smite. Ibid. (1667), P. L., VI. 251. With huge two-handed sway Brandisht aloft the horrid edge came down.
1814. Scott, Diary, 22 Aug., in Lockhart. The effigy of a warrior completely armed … with his hand on his two-handed broadsword.
1837. Penny Cycl., VIII. 283/1. This was probably the finger-alphabet from which our present two-handed one was derived.
1874. Swinburne, Bothwell, IV. ii. The sword Which was my grandsire’s, whose two-handed stroke Did such-like service.
2. Wielded or worked by the hands of two persons, as a saw; engaged in or played by two persons, as a card-game, etc.: = prec. 2.
1657. R. Ligon, Barbadoes (1673), 41. Cutting it with two-handed Saws.
1680. Cotton, Compl. Gamester, x. 83. Some play at two handed, or three handed whist.
1827. J. Wilson, Noct. Ambr., Wks. 1855, I. 274. I’m real happy … to think that we’re to hae a twa-handed crack.
1853. Sir H. Douglas, Milit. Bridges, vi. (ed. 3), 303. A plank … upon which … two men may stand to … work, conjointly, a heavy two-handed beetle.
1898. To-Day, 5 Nov., 19/2. The Captain sat down to play two-handed poker with Chris.
3. colloq. Big, bulky, strapping. ? Obs.
1687. T. Brown, Saints in Uproar, Wks. 1730, I. 73. A huge two-handed lubber, St. Christopher I think they call him.
1692. trans. C’tess D’Aunoy’s Trav., iii. (1706), 44. The Hair … being … kept behind their Ears with a great Twohanded [mistranslating Fr. doublé ‘lined’] Hat.
a. 1700. B. E., Dict. Cant. Crew, Strapping-Lass, a swinging two-handed Woman.
1749. Fielding, Tom Jones, IX. iii. This Susan was as two-handed a wench (according to the phrase) as any in the country.
1830. Lamb, Lett. to Wordsworth, 22 Jan. [Vulcan] the two-handed skinker.
4. Having two hands.
1847. Carpenter, Zool., 132. Bimana, or two-handed Mammals. Ibid., 137. Man alone is two-handed.
5. Using both hands equally well, ambidextrous; dexterous, handy, efficient.
1861. Whyte-Melville, Good for Nothing, xxvii. A mon soon learns to be two-handed in the bush.
Hence Two-handedness. So Two-hander, a two-handed sword; † Two-handy a. = sense 1.
1884. Morning Appeal (Carson City, NV), 24 June, 2/1. President Garfield could write well with either hand. He had practiced two-handedness from boyhood.
1891. Home Missionary (N. Y.), Jan., 389. A holy *two-handedness.
1888. Archæologia, LI. 512. The sword … is an exceedingly handsome example of the *two-hander of the sixteenth century.
1648. Hexham, II. Een Slach-swaerdt, a *two-handie Sword.
