Definitions
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. A blow with the fist: commonly in the plural, combat with the fists; cuffs of the fist given and taken.
Wiktionary
- n. A fistfight.
- n. A cuff or blow administered with the fist.
- v. To engage in a physical fight.
- v. To strike, fight or spar with the fists.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. A cuff or blow with the fist or hand.
Examples
“I recall a fisticuff between a town and country boy, about fifteen years old each.”
“The trains that were expected to disgorge thousands of fisticuff fans into the Sweetgrass Hills rolled emptily along.”
“Of course Terrill reported me for this, and my ire was so inflamed by his action that when we next met I attacked him, and a fisticuff engagement in front of barracks followed, which was stopped by an officer appearing on the scene.”
Fictionaut: She Makes Her Mouth Small & Round & Other Stories
“Action sequences are brief and unimaginative, and neither Vin nor Yeoh get to strut their funky stuff beyond the odd fisticuff or gunfight.”
“In the process, we reliably gathered that the argument degenerated into a fisticuff during which Kingsley gave up the ghost as a result of the severe battering he sustained from his assailant.”
Man, 60, Kills Brother-In-Law Over Inadequate Care Of Sister
“Athena got her baby back baby back, baby back without so much as a raised fisticuff.”
“In no account of this great conflict is any precision observed concerning the pell-mell and fisticuff parts of it.”
“Probably if I had a fisticuff fight -- she's pretty tough; she probably would have beat me.”
“God was so real to you that you would challenge Him to a fisticuff!”
“But it was beneath the dignity thus outraged, to avenge itself by a vulgar fisticuff, and A---- bethought him of a much better and more honorable course.”
Western Characters or Types of Border Life in the Western States
Lists
‘fisticuff’ hasn't been added to any lists yet.
reesetee Or one of them got all smart-alecked and said he'd fight with one hand tied behind his back, so the other one was all, "Okay, you're ON, sucker!" and he decided he wanted to fight with one hand tied behind his back too.
Mind you, someone else would have had to do the tying. Jan 9, 2008
chained_bear Well, suppose a fight broke out that ended after one hit. You could say the men came to fisticuff.
No, seriously. It sounds like something Twain would have said, doesn't it? Jan 9, 2008
reesetee Because one would use both fists, I'd imagine. :-) Jan 8, 2008
yarb I've never heard this in the singular before. But why not? Jan 8, 2008