# Hand position > The hand position is the formal posture for strapping the palm: one hand held out flat, supported underneath by the other, and held still for the stroke. - Canonical URL: https://consensualspanking.co.uk/glossary/hand-position/ - Section: A–Z - Updated: November 2026 (2026-11-01) - Audience: consenting adults over 18 only. Everything on this site concerns consenting adults over 18. A small piece of formal choreography for strokes to the palm. It is also, as it happens, the correct way to do it, which is rarer than you would think. --- ## In short - It is the posture for strokes to the palm between consenting adults over 18, usually with the tawse. - The position: one hand out flat and palm up, the other hand underneath supporting it. - The support is functional. It stops the hand dropping and the stroke landing across the wrist. - Use a flexible strap, never a cane, keep it genuinely light, and stop at any numbness or tingling. Adults only. Everything on this page is between consenting adults over 18. ## What it means The hand position is the posture used when a strap is brought down on the palm. One hand held out in front, flat, fingers together, palm upwards, at roughly waist height. The other hand placed underneath, supporting it at the wrist or under the back of the hand. Then held still. The usual instrument is the tawse, the Scottish leather strap. The site has a full treatment of this, including the anatomy, the appeal and the version I would actually do, on [hands and the tawse](https://consensualspanking.co.uk/guide/hands-and-the-tawse/). Go there before doing any of it. This entry covers the position itself. ## Why the position exists It looks like theatre and it is not. The supporting hand underneath stops the target hand dropping away as the strap comes down, and a hand that drops turns a stroke aimed at the palm into a stroke across the wrist. That is where the carpal bones and the shallow nerves are, and it is the injury nobody wants. The other function is that presenting the hand yourself, and keeping it there, is the psychological centre of the whole thing. Almost nobody who asks me about this wants pain in the hands. They want the sequence: being named, standing up, being told to hold the hand out, and having to hold it still. The stroke is nearly incidental. ## In practice If two adults want to do this, the position is the easy part and the restraint is the hard part. - A flexible leather strap. Never a cane. Leather follows the contour of the palm and spreads the load; a cane concentrates everything into a line a few millimetres wide over shallow bone. - Palm only. Not the back of the hand, where the metacarpals sit almost against the skin. Not fingers, knuckles or wrist. - The hand supported underneath, exactly as described. This is the whole reason the position is the right one. - Very few strokes. Two, four, six. This is not somewhere you build up. - Much lighter than you think you want. The ceremony is doing the work. - Stop at the first tingling, numbness or pins and needles. That is nerve rather than skin and it does not improve by carrying on. The compromise most people settle on, and the one I would suggest: keep the ritual on the hands and put the force somewhere else. Two light strokes to the palm in the correct position, then bend over. Nearly everything anybody wants from this scenario happens in the first thirty seconds, before anything has landed at all. ## A note on the other sense Hand position also gets used to mean where the hands go in any posture, and it matters more than it sounds. Hands flat on a desk, or gripping the far edge of a chair, or on the head, or clasped behind the back. Each changes how much someone can brace, how exposed they feel, and how tempted they are to reach back, which is the commonest way a hand gets struck by accident. There is more on this on [positions](https://consensualspanking.co.uk/guide/positions/). > **The legal line.** Under *R v Brown* [1993], consent is not a defence to actual bodily harm in England and Wales. Redness and light bruising generally sit below that threshold, and heavy bruising may not. A fracture does not, and a broken bone in the hand is the most likely way anything described on this site ends up on the wrong side of that line. Both people are exposed if it happens. ## Read next - [Hands and the tawse](https://consensualspanking.co.uk/guide/hands-and-the-tawse/) - [Positions](https://consensualspanking.co.uk/guide/positions/) - [Implements and what each one does](https://consensualspanking.co.uk/guide/implements/) - [Roleplay and dress](https://consensualspanking.co.uk/guide/roleplay-and-dress/) ## Sources 1. *R v Brown* [1993] UKHL 19, House of Lords. [bailii.org](https://www.bailii.org/uk/cases/UKHL/1993/19.html) > **Not legal advice.** Where this page mentions the law, it is general information written from an England and Wales position unless it says otherwise, and it is not legal advice. Scotland and Northern Ireland have their own law. If your own legal position matters, speak to a solicitor. ## Common questions ### What is the hand position for the tawse? One hand held out flat at about waist height, palm up, with the other hand placed underneath to support it. The supporting hand stops the target dropping on impact, which is what makes the position more than a formality. Use a tawse or another flexible strap for it, never a cane. ### Is the hand position safe? The position itself is the safest way to present a hand, because the support underneath prevents the stroke landing across the wrist. What is not safe is force. The hand has 27 bones, with tendons and shallow nerves under very little padding, so keep it light, use a flexible strap rather than a cane, use very few strokes, and stop at any tingling or numbness.