History of Left Handed People

“Only left handed people are right in their brain”
It is fairly safe to assume that those interested in the history of left handed people, will indeed be left handed people themselves. Right-handed people basically take their dominance for granted. However, it is a fascinating subject for all, because almost everybody knows a “leftie”, as a family member, close friend, work colleague, school pal, whoever.

Stone Age implements discovered seem equally divided between left and right and studies of cave drawings have indicated a preference for the left hand. When tools became more sophisticated, a clear hand preference emerged. The right hand preference may have originated in sun worship.

For thousands of years, the Devil has been associated with the left hand in various ways and is normally portrayed as being left-handed in pictures and other images. In the seventeenth century it was thought that the Devil baptised his followers with his left-hand .There are many references in superstitions to the "left-hand side" being associated with evil. It is also considered that we can only see ghosts if we look over our left shoulder and that the Devil watches us over the left shoulder.

In the Northern hemisphere you have to face south to follow the sun and move from left to right until the suns sets in the west. This gave moving to the right and the right hand side a great significance. Another theory says that as the heart is on the left hand side, a shield would have to be in the left hand to defend it and any weapon therefore had to be held in the right, which became the dominant hand. Recent theories have included one with the right-handedness is the normality and left-handedness is a deficiency which results from a traumatic birth! Left-handers have done quite badly over the years and many old superstitions still survive today.

Looking into the history of left handed people will shock today’s generation when they learn that in previous centuries, they would be spanked in school and chastised at home for being different. Their left hands would be tied behind their backs, in an effort to force them to write with their “correct” hand.      There used to be extreme and severe suspicions of anything left. In the history of left handed people, the Latin term for left is sinister, which in modern English can be interpreted as meaning “evil”; “menacing”; or “threatening”. By contrast, “Dexter” is the Latin word for right, which is used in a complimentary way when talking of someone well skilled in the hands, i.e. “dexterous”.                

In researching the history of left handed people, scientists have discovered that the left-hander uses both sides of their brain evenly, while the right-hander is controlled more from the left. One theory, with regard to hand preference, is that it is determined from two manifestations of a gene at the same point. These genes are referred to as the “C” and “D” genes. The D gene is more numerous and consequently leads to the majority of the population favoring their right-hand. The C gene is less likely to occur, but when it does, the hand preference of the individual will be split 50/50 between rights and left.

Throughout the history of left handed people, there have been many only too willing to cast disparaging remarks. One such person was a 19th-century Italian criminologist named Cesare Lombroso , who famously spoke of “Left-handedness being a stigma of degeneracy”. Such statements have thankfully long since disappeared from the views of the world, and it is worth remembering that, if ever on the receiving end of any derogatory comments from a “rightie”; the left side of your brain controls the right side of your body, and the right side of your brain controls the left side of your body; so only left handed people are in their right mind!