Meaning & use
bare hands
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Meanings
nounplural
Hands that have no gloves, tools or weapons, used to show that nothing extra is held or worn.
Grammar: Almost always plural and often after with: she moved the rocks with her bare hands.
Patterns
- with your bare hands
- using bare hands
He dug through the snow with his bare hands.
Never touch the broken glass with your bare hands.
The child caught the frog in his bare hands.
nounpluralfigurative
A person's own physical strength and skill when doing something difficult without help from tools or machines.
Grammar: Figurative use stressing effort: they built the cabin with their bare hands.
Patterns
- build something with your bare hands
The villagers rebuilt the bridge with their bare hands.
Grandfather says he built the wall with his bare hands.
The climber freed the rope with his bare hands.
Common combinations
- with your bare hands
- She pulled the weeds up with her bare hands.
- fight with bare hands
- The knight fought with bare hands after losing his sword.
- dig with bare hands
- They dug with bare hands to reach the trapped cat.
- handle with bare hands
- Do not handle the chemicals with bare hands.
- kill with bare hands
- He claimed he could tear the phone book with bare hands.
Synonyms and how they differ
- naked hands
- Naked hands is possible but sounds odd, since bare is the usual word for uncovered body parts.
- unprotected hands
- Unprotected hands stresses the lack of safety gear, whereas bare hands stresses having no tools.
- own two hands
- Own two hands emphasizes personal effort, while bare hands stresses the lack of tools.
Opposites
Word family
Commonly confused: bare hands or bear hands?
bare hands vs bear hands
Bear is the animal or the verb meaning to carry; bare means uncovered, so the correct spelling is bare hands.
Practice
The firefighters had no equipment, so they moved the rubble with their ___.
Choose one answer.
Bare hands, with bare meaning uncovered, is the fixed phrase. Bear is a different word, and the other forms break the idiom.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “bare hands”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.