Kiss Hands (To)

To kiss the hand of the sovereign either on accepting or retiring from a high government office. (See Kiss.)

“Kissing the hand to the statue of a god was a Roman form of adoration.”—Spencer: Principles of Sociology, vol. ii. part iv. chap. 6, p. 123.

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Entry taken from Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, edited by the Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D. and revised in 1895.