The most commonly repeated suggestion as to how 'dukes' came to mean 'fists' is that it derives from the Cockney rhyming slang - Duke of Yorks -> forks -> fingers/hands.Īt first sight this seems rather unlikely as the link between forks and fingers is hardly intuitive. I landed a stinger on his 'potatoe trap' with my left 'duke,' drawing the 'Claret' and 'sending him to grass.' The origin of the expression Chamberlain used it in his memoir My Confession, Recollections of a Rogue, circa 1859: The use of 'dukes' meaning 'hands' is first referred to in print in the mid 19th century, in both England and the USA. There doesn't appear to be any obvious connection between 'dukes' and 'fists' so, before we get to 'put up your dukes', we need an explanation of how the two words came to be linked.

What's the origin of the phrase 'Put up your dukes'?