Fisticuffs

Definitions: Fisticuffs

Fisticuffs

Noun

1. A fight with bare fists.

2. Fighting with the fists.

Date "fisticuffs" was first used in popular English literature: sometime before 1615. (references)

Synonyms: Fisticuffs

Synonyms: boxing (n), fistfight (n), pugilism (n), slugfest (n). (additional references)

Context	Synonyms within Context (source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus).
Contention	Wrestling, greco-roman wrestling; pugilism, boxing, fisticuffs, the manly art of self-defense; spar, mill, set-to, round, bout, event, prize fighting; quarterstaff, single stick; gladiatorship, gymnastics; jiujitsu, jujutsu, kooshti, sumo; athletics, athletic sports; games of skill.
	Verb: contend; contest, strive, struggle, scramble, wrestle; spar, square; exchange blows, exchange fisticuffs; fib, justle, tussle, tilt, box, stave, fence; skirmish; pickeer; fight; (war); wrangle; (quarrel).
Retaliation	Verb: retaliate, retort, turn upon; pay, pay off, pay back; pay in one's own coin, pay in the same coin; cap; reciprocate; turn the tables upon, return the compliment; give a quid pro quo; Noun: give as much as one takes, give as good as one gets; give and take, exchange fisticuffs; be quits, be even with; pay off old scores.
Source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus.

Domain	Usage
Movie/TV Titles	Fisticuffs (1928)
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits.

Domain	Title
Music	Fisticuffs Bluff (reference) (more classical music examples; more popular music examples)
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits.

"Fisticuffs" is generally used as a noun (plural) -- approximately 96.00% of the time. "Fisticuffs" is used about 25 times out of a sample of 100 million words spoken or written in English. Its rank is based on over 700,000 words used in the English language. Some parts-of-speech are not covered due to the samples used by the British National Corpus. (note: percents less than one-hundredth of one percent have been omitted)

Parts of Speech	Percent	Usage per 100 Million Words	Rank in English
Noun (plural)	96%	24	71,196
Lexical Verb (-s form)	4%	1	339,140
Total	100.00%	25	N/A

The following statistics estimate the number of searches per day across the major English-language search engines as identified by various trade publications. Hyperlinks lead to commercial use of the expression at Amazon.com.

Language		Translations for "fisticuffs"; alternative meanings/domain in parentheses.
Albanian		rrahje me grushte. (various references)

Arabic		‏تلاكم (boxing), ‏تضارب بجمع الكف, ‏إشتباك (clash, engagement). (various references)

Bulgarian		бой с юмруци (punch-up, stand-up fight). (various references)

Czech		pìstní zápas (fisticuff, pugilism). (various references)

French		bagarre (fight, fighting), accrochage (fight, filling station). (various references)

German		Faustschläge (punches). (various references)

Hebrew		ת�'רת י�"ים, �"תא�'רפות (boxing), �"תכתשות (fight, fracas, melee, roughhouse, wrestling). (various references)

Hungarian		bunyó (aggro, fight, free for all, hammering, mill, punch-up, thrashing), bokszol (fisticuff, to box, to mill, to spar), ökölvívás (boxing, fisticuff, noble art, pugilism, ring). (various references)

Italian		pugilato (boxing, pugilism). (various references)

Japanese Kanji		挌闘 (fight, fist fight, melee, scuffle, wrestling). (various references)

Japanese Katakana		かくとう (definite answer, fight, fist fight, grappling, hand-to-hand fighting, melee, scuffle, square hand-lantern, wrestling). (various references)

Pig Latin		isticuffsfay

Portuguese		pugilístico (pugilistic). (various references)

Romanian		pugilism (boxing, pugilism). (various references)

Russian		кулачный бой (fistfight, pugilism, set to, stand-up fight). (various references)

Serbo-Croatian		borba pesnicama (fisticuff). (various references)

Spanish		puñetazos (punching). (various references)

Swedish		slagsmål (action, affray, battle, brawl, ding-dong, dust-up, fight, fighting, Gore, mix up, rough and tumble, rough-house, row, scramble, scrap, scuffle, set to, struggle, tussle). (various references)

Thai		การต่อสู้โ�"ยการแลกหมั�". (various references)

Turkish		yumruklaşma (exchange of blows, punch-up), yumruk kavgası. (various references)

Ukranian		кулачний бій (knock down). (various references)
Source: compiled by the editor from various translation references.

Misspellings
	"Fisticuffs" is suggested in spellcheckers for the following: fistacuffs. (additional references)
Source: compiled by the editor, based on several corpora (additional references).

# of Phoneme Matches	Pronunciation	Word(s) rhyming with "fisticuffs" (pronounced fi"stiku'fs)
4	-k u' f s	handcuffs.
3	-u' f s	dyestuffs, earmuffs, foodstuffs.
Source: compiled by the editor (additional references); see credits.

Scrabble® Enable2K-Verified Anagrams
	Words within the letters "c-f-f-f-i-i-s-s-t-u"
	-3 letters: fustics.
	-4 letters: cistus, fistic, fustic, scuffs, stiffs, stuffs.
	-5 letters: cists, cuffs, cuifs, cutis, ficus, fiscs, fists, ictus, scuff, scuts, sifts, situs, stiff, stuff, suits, tiffs, tuffs.
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. SCRABBLE® is a registered trademark. All intellectual property rights in and to the game are owned in the U.S.A and Canada by Hasbro Inc., and throughout the rest of the world by J.W. Spear & Sons Limited of Maidenhead, Berkshire, England, a subsidiary of Mattel Inc. Mattel and Spear are not affiliated with Hasbro.