Question for Readers: Origin of This Familiar MC Gesture?

I’ve come across a discussion circulating on Brazilian liturgical Instagram pages dismissing a particular gesture—hands joined with fingers extended and touching, instead of folded—as something invented, lacking any historical grounding.

I’ve seen photos, like those of Cardinal Dante using this posture, and I’m convinced it’s rooted in liturgical tradition, not just modern preference. However, I’ve struggled to find solid written sources or rubrical references that explicitly mention or explain this gesture.

Do readers happen to know of any official rubrics, commentaries, or scholarly works that support the legitimacy or origin of this specific form of joined hands? My best guess is that it’s a kind of “courtly” gesture, not something formally documented, but passed down organically through tradition. But I would like to be proved incorrect!

UPDATE: A resourceful seminarian reader, whose comment on Stercky I shared below after the article, sent me two interesting old images in which one can see the old-style surplice that would have required holding hands together to keep it aloft: