Clockwise

I frequently say "left" when I mean "right", though I seldom say "right" when I mean "left". Strange that it should be asymmetrical like that.

Strange also that I have no such difficulty with the arguably more complex concept of "clockwise" versus "anticlockwise". Why should that be? (Although I should note that I once got very confused trying to screw in a screw with my left hand and the screwdriver pointing up. Once I stopped thinking about it things got easier. As is true of many things in life.)

I was wondering the other day what the word for "clockwise" is in other languages. If anyone knows, I would be interested to hear - especially if they don't involve the concept of clocks.

After a bit of pondering, it seemed to me that clock hands move the direction that they do because that's the direction that a sundial shadow moves in the northern hemisphere, where they like to invent mechanical things like clocks. But before mechanical clocks came around how did they describe the two varieties of circular motion? In Latin, for example - was it something to do with the sun?

It seems to me that the only thing which consistently moves in the same circular direction is the sun and things that follow it, like shadows or sprouting plants. Maybe in other languages the word for clockwise is shadowwise, or plantwise. That would be much cooler than naming such an important concept after a purely arbitrary mechanical convention. We might as well say "closing-the-jar-lid-wise".

And why don't clocks go the other way round in the southern hemisphere like the shadows, plants and jar lids do?