a. [f. prec. sb.]
1. With the back of the hand.
1813. L. Hunt, in Examiner, 15 March, 162/1. A back-handed pat on the cheek.
1836. Macready, Remin., II. 23. I struck him as he rose a backhanded slap across the face.
2. Directed backwards, or with the hand or arm crossing the body (i.e., for a right-handed man from left to right), as a sword-cut; sloping backwards, as handwriting.
3. fig. † a. Keeping back one’s hand, backward, remiss; b. Indirect, like a back-handed sword-cut.
1817. Godwin, Mandeville, II. 180 (D.). Modesty … is often the most beggarly and back-handed friend that merit can have.
1818. Scott, Rob Roy, II. xiii. (ed. 2), 292–3. Rob might get a back-handed lick at him.
1865. Dickens, Mut. Fr., xii. Having given her this back-handed reminder.
Hence Backhandedness.
1859. in Worcester.
