 The "quarter" probably refers to the means of production, the staff being made from quartersawn hardwood (as opposed to a staff of lower quality made from conventionally sawn lumber or from a tree branch).The possibility that the name derives from the way the staff is held, the right hand grasping it one-quarter of the distance from the lower end, is suggested in Encyclopædia Britannica.While this interpretation may have given rise to such positions in 19th-century manuals,
it probably arose by popular etymology.