What does 男手一つで育てる literally mean?


> 紅緒を男手一つで育てた陸軍少佐。

It's from はいからさんが通る.

It means "Major who raised Benio with his own (male) help", right?

To me, if "help" could be countable in English, it would be "Major who raised
Benio with one (male) help". In this case, "his own" is implicit. Am I right?




The issue here is with your understanding of the word [男手]{おとこで}, which
Google's definition gives as:

> 労働力としての男子。「―でなければできない仕事」「―が足りない」。また、普通は女がすることを男がすること。  
>  「妻に死なれ―で育てた子」

The meaning is kind of hard to explain. In my humble opinion, I think the best
way to understand it, at least in this context, is to see it as something
along the lines of "as a man". You can say 男手で育てる, but you can also say
男手一つで育てる with more emphasis on the fact that it is one person that does all
the hard work. The emphasis is put there by the inclusion of 一つ to imply the
potential difficulties a single male parent may have faced raising kids.

> 紅緒を男手一つで育てた陸軍少佐。  
>  The army major who raised 紅緒 as a single dad

By the way it's always 男手一つで or [女手]{おんなで}一つで, and never 男手一人で or 女手一人で. As
for why it is 一つ, not 一人: this is a typical example of
[synecdoche](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synecdoche). 男手 means the hard work
done by a man or literally a man's hand, standing in place for the person.
Since the literal meaning still points to the hand, you use 一つ, not 一人. Also
you don't really hear or see 男手二つ, at least not until same-sex marriage gets
fully legalized, recognized and normalized in Japan. But even then you may
still not hear 男手二つ, because 男手一つ and 女手一つ are used to emphasize the
difficulty facing single parenting.




The issue here is with your understanding of the word [男手]{おとこで}, which
Google's definition gives as:

> 労働力としての男子。「―でなければできない仕事」「―が足りない」。また、普通は女がすることを男がすること。  
>  「妻に死なれ―で育てた子」

The meaning is kind of hard to explain. In my humble opinion, I think the best
way to understand it, at least in this context, is to see it as something
along the lines of "as a man". You can say 男手で育てる, but you can also say
男手一つで育てる with more emphasis on the fact that it is one person that does all
the hard work. The emphasis is put there by the inclusion of 一つ to imply the
potential difficulties a single male parent may have faced raising kids.

> 紅緒を男手一つで育てた陸軍少佐。  
>  The army major who raised 紅緒 as a single dad

By the way it's always 男手一つで or [女手]{おんなで}一つで, and never 男手一人で or 女手一人で. As
for why it is 一つ, not 一人: this is a typical example of
[synecdoche](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synecdoche). 男手 means the hard work
done by a man or literally a man's hand, standing in place for the person.
Since the literal meaning still points to the hand, you use 一つ, not 一人. Also
you don't really hear or see 男手二つ, at least not until same-sex marriage gets
fully legalized, recognized and normalized in Japan. But even then you may
still not hear 男手二つ, because 男手一つ and 女手一つ are used to emphasize the
difficulty facing single parenting.

