The thumb

Cheiro 1897 gives the thumb special weight. He says the truth of palmistry could rest on the thumb alone, and points to gypsies, Indian readers and the Chinese as groups who build their readings on it. Benham 1900 makes a similar report. In his account many Hindu readers rest all their work on the thumb, and the Chinese read the fine skin ridges of its first phalange by an elaborate system. Heron-Allen 1885 describes a Chinese method of reading the print of the thumb, pressed into soft wax or inked and stamped on paper.

Cheiro divides the thumb into three parts, standing for will, logic and love. The nail phalange is will, the second is logic, and the third, which borders the Mount of Venus, is love. When one part is out of proportion he reads the imbalance: a very long first phalange means reliance on will over reason, and a second phalange much longer than the first means sound reasoning but too little will to carry ideas out.

Cheiro also checks whether the first joint is supple, so that it bends back in an arch, or stiff. He reads the supple joint as adaptable and free with money and thought, and the stiff joint as the opposite, more practical. Benham reads size instead, with a big thumb going with firmness and choices made by reason, and a small one with less firmness and choices made by feeling.