Glyph origins of the character 拜 I've seen somewhere that it was two hands together greeting someone. It makes some sense since the left part does look like 手, but the right part doesn't, and I don't remember any other characters that have it.

What's the real story about the character 拜?
「拜」was originally「」, comprised of「手・扌」and「」.


  「」(please read this in both meaning and sound as「禱」) depicts flowery adornments used in dances and religious prayer/rituals.
  
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The combination of「手」(hand) and「」(flowery adornments used in dances and religious prayer/rituals) indicated the meaning to conduct obeisance.

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In the character「」, the bottom part of「」was sometimes corrupted into something that looked like「手」.

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Similarly, the top part of「」, which is「卉」, was sometimes removed. This leads on to the modern form of「拜」.

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References:


季旭昇《說文新證》
小學堂
國學大師


郭沫若《甲骨文合集》
中國社會科學院考古研究所《殷周金文集成》