Handsful

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A quantity that can be held in a person's hands
2. the amount that fills the open palms when they are cupped together
3. a handful of something, usually referring to a small, manageable portion

Etymology: "Handsful" is the plural of "handful", and the plural is where the trouble starts: "handful" is a compound already, a joining of "hand" and "full" that appears in Old English as "handfull" and meant as much as it does now, the quantity a hand can hold. The "-ful" ending is an old, productive piece of English, which is why "handful" sits comfortably beside "spoonful" and "armful" and why it is so easy to treat as a suffix sitting on a noun. The plural is the awkward part. Because "handful" ends in "-ful", the standard plural is "handfuls", with the s added at the end of the whole compound, and "handsful" is a non-standard spelling that people sometimes produce by pluralizing the first element, as if the word were "hand" plus "full" and the hands were the things counted. Speakers often make this mistake because "hands" is so familiar in phrases like "two hands", but the plural belongs at the end.