openhanded

O1P3E1N1H4A1N1D2E1D2

adjective

Done with an open hand.

Scrabble 17

Meanings

adjectiveopenhanded (comparative more openhanded, superlative most openhanded)

comparative more openhanded · superlative most openhanded

  1. Alternative form of open-handed.
    1. Done with an open hand.

      And when I did not answer, f-for my mouth was t-too dry for speech, he asked again, and I stammered out some nonsense, and then he struck me, openhanded, as though I was not a man.

      2015, Alexis Hall, Shackles: A Prosperity Story, →ISBN, page 45
      1 more example

      In the painting, the enslaved and (as conjectured by historian Steven Weisenburger) sexually abused Margaret Garner betrays her liaison with her owner Archibald Gaines with an exposed, openhanded gesture toward him.

      2008, Richard J. Powell, Cutting a Figure: Fashioning Black Portraiture, →ISBN, page 52
    2. Generous.

      In the economic realm, because of its temporary preponderance, the United States could afford to be openhanded.

      1995, Robert L. Paarlberg, Leadership Abroad Begins at Home: U.S. Foreign Economic Policy After the Cold War, →ISBN
      1 more example

      Yet he understood nothing of real magnanimity; his charity was part of an openhanded recklessness, which made him fling the goods of fortune to the wind as soon as gained—part of the character of grand seigneur he aspired to assume.

      1888, John Addington Symonds, Renaissance in Italy - Volume 5, page 400
    3. Frank and tolerant.

      The challengeof maintaining this awareness is to sit openhanded to receive all that comes.

      2014, Sister Simone Campbell, A Nun on the Bus: How All of Us Can Create Hope, Change, and Community, →ISBN
      2 more examples

      Let selling be an openhanded selling, with justly balanced scales and price which do not prejudice either party, buyer or seller.

      1989, Seyyed Hossein Nasr, Hamid Dabashi, Seyyed Vali Reza Nasr, Expectation of the Millennium: Shi'ism in History, →ISBN, page 82

      Arm-in-arm with religious liberals stand a legion of openhanded political liberals, humanists, and, of course, homosexuals themselves, all of whom passionately embrace homosexuality as a morally and constitutionally justified “alternative lifestyle."

      2006, Hal Brunson, Lesbos, Narcissus, and Paulos, →ISBN, page ix
    4. Loose and full.

      We believe the majority of Swiss guides use the Swiss loop at the end of the rope, and the openhanded loop in the middle.

      1891, The Alpine Journal - Volume 15, page 7
      1 more example

      The iconic flower of love could be found in every state of its life cycle -- tender green shoots with tiny green thorns that looked like baby teeth, buds determined not to reveal themselves any sooner than necessary, fresh blooms that resemble sleepers just opening their eyes, and full blosssoms with the openhanded beauty of an old person's wrinkled face.

      2012, T.D. Jakes, Let it Go: Forgive So You Can Be Forgiven, →ISBN
adverbopenhanded (comparative more openhanded, superlative most openhanded)

comparative more openhanded · superlative most openhanded

  1. Alternative form of open-handed.
    1. With an open hand or hands.

      Patterson smacks her openhanded on the side of the head.

      2014, Benjamin Whitmer, Cry Father, →ISBN, page 278
    2. Generously.
      1 more example

      He leaves the mild Alexander to continue, under the pressure of fraternal competition, the hereditary policy of Peter and Catherine; to raise levy after levy, loan after loan, ineffectually, while loans of any amount required are given openhanded by the people of France and England to their governments and the seas of the world remain open to the commerce of the Allies.

      1856, The Living Age - Volume 48, page 502
verb
  1. participlepastsimple past and past participle of openhand

Synonyms & antonyms

Synonym sets from Open English WordNet, CC BY 4.0.

Cite this entry
APA

openhanded. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 2, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/openhanded

MLA

“openhanded.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/openhanded. Accessed November 2, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “openhanded,” accessed November 2, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/openhanded.

Source: openhanded on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.