Brass knuckles

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"Classic" pattern brass knuckles

Brass knuckles, also sometimes called knuckles, knucks or knuckle dusters (more common in British English), are weapons used in hand-to-hand combat. Brass knuckles are pieces of metal, usually steel despite their name, shaped to fit around the knuckles. Designed to deliver the force of punches through a smaller and harder contact area, they result in greater tissue disruption and increased likelihood of fracturing the victim's bones on impact. Also, the wielder of such a weapon may punch harder than normal, exacerbating damage even further, due to reduced anxiety about harming their own hands when striking.

1 History and variations
2 Legality and distribution
3 Use
4 Typology
5 In popular culture
6 References

[edit] History and variations

Early forms of brass knuckles were used in ancient Rome, India, South America and Japan.

The Roman caestus was a type of glove or hand guard made from leather and metal used during boxing matches in gladiatorial events. Although modern day boxing gloves are used to keep the hands safe, thereby allowing the fighter to punch harder, the caestus was used solely to intensify the damage caused by a punch.

Vajra Mushti (Diamond Fist or Thunderbolt Fist) was the name of both a knuckle duster weapon and an ancient Indian martial arts identified with that weapon that incorporates striking and grappling aspects, and a study of vital points. The bagh nakh or "tiger claw" is a similar Indian weapon meant to be worn over the knuckles, although it is a slashing rather than bludgeoning device.

A similar weapon, the tekko, is one of the traditional weapons of kobudo, a martial art from Okinawa, Japan.

Knuckle dusters were incorporated into the so-called Apache revolvers used by criminals in France in the early 1900s. During World War I and World War II, trench knives, blades with enlarged guards to be used as knuckle dusters, were used in hand-to-hand combat in trench raiding operations.

The British gangster Dave Courtney is famous for using brass knuckles when debt collecting.

[edit] Legality and distribution

In most countries, the possession, let alone use, of brass knuckles is illegal. Recently, brass knuckles are being sold on the Internet and in regular shops as novelties, although whether or not they are used as novelties is open to debate.

Brass knuckles can normally be purchased at flea markets, swap meets, and some sword and weapon shops. Due to a shady reputation they are often sold as paperweights or affixed with a detachable screw allowing them to be sold as a "belt buckle".

A new type of brass knuckle which is often called "Clear knuckles" is made out of bulletproof glass that is, so far, legal in the United States. In difference, "Clear knuckles" are designed to tear flesh and inflict topical pain, instead of brass knuckles that are designed to break bone. They are much lighter but still can be very dangerous.

[edit] Use

Pairs of knuckles can be custom made to fit individual hands. Due to the generic factory shape and design, knuckles rarely fit the user perfectly. This can result in breaking the user's fingers if a punch is thrown straight forward. A common home-remedy is to fix or tape up the grip with electrical tape or gauze tape to ensure a better fit.

Zinc oxide plaster wrapped around the knuckles protects the hands and makes the knuckles a better fit, so there is less chance of dropping them during a mêlée. The fact that the plaster is flesh colored makes them less noticeable.

[edit] Typology

Often made in factories in Pakistan^[1] or China, brass variety are much lighter and less likely to be detected.

Common varieties are spiked knuckles, "fat boys", "wedding rings", brass knuckles with various "imprintable" images on the knuckles (longhorn steer, lions, skulls, etc), and even "knuckle-knives."

Spiked knuckles are seen to be of the most vicious variety of brass knuckles as they not only can shatter bone into fragments but will shred tissue. The length of the spikes varies from as small as a quarter of an inch to up to six inches. Shorter spikes emphasise the impact of the brass knuckle on bone, while longer blades are used solely to inflict soft-tissue damage.

Certain brass knuckles are available with knives (especially flick knives) built in. These are very dangerous as a hand-to-hand fight can lead to a more serious situation where great injury or even death may be the outcome. These knife dusters are available in many countries across the world and should be handled with care.

[edit] In popular culture

A normal pair of brass knuckles was wielded on D-Day in Band of Brothers.

In the 2005 BBC rendition of Tom Brown's Schooldays, Flashman secretly puts knuckledusters on during a fight and knocks Brown to the ground in one punch and knocks him out entirely with one more, inflicting a large cut across his forehead.

In the book The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini, the character Assef used brass knuckles each time he fought someone throughout the novel. This was most notable at the end where Assef and the main character fight and Assef breaks the narrator's face bones and ribs.

Professional wrestlers William Regal, Chris Jericho, John Cena, and Armando Alejandro Estrada, among others, have been known to use brass knuckles during their bouts.

The main character in Three O'Clock High wins a fight against a bully by using brass knuckles.

In the film Constantine, the main character, John Constantine, uses a pair of brass knuckles with crosses etched into them in his fight with Balthazar.

Brass knuckles are available as weapons for at least some characters in the video games Doom, Doom II, Day of Defeat: Source, Grand Theft Auto, The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay and Mafia: The City of Lost Heaven.

Spiked weapons resembling brass knuckles (though perhaps more similar to bagh nakh) have appeared in Final Fantasy Tactics Advance as "knuckles", Final Fantasy VIII as "Spiked Gloves", RuneScape as "Claws" and World of Warcraft as "fist-weapons." There has also been considerable use of "knuckle duster" type weaponry in the Castlevania series such as Circle of the Moon and Dawn of Sorrow. Asuma Sarutobi from the anime Naruto uses brass knuckles (commonly known as trench knives) when fighting his opponents, which he extends with his chakra to injure an enemy out of the physical blade's range

In the 2006 TV adaption of the Robin Hood tale, Marian uses her wedding ring as a knuckle duster to knuckle out her husband-to-be Guy of Gisborne at the altar.

Body modification fans have been known to have a silicone implant shaped like a set of brass knuckles placed under the skin on the upper part of the chest.