Moustache rode into English through French and Greek
Facial hair grown above the upper lip defines a moustache, or mustache in the US. Styles have cycled for millennia, from Old Kingdom Egypt to Victorian soldiers, and the word itself travelled from Greek through Latin and Italian into French before English borrowed it. The longest on record stretches 4.29 metres.
A moustache is facial hair grown between the upper lip and the nose, mostly by men. Someone wearing one is 'moustached', or 'moustachioed' when it is especially large or bushy. The word is French, taken from the fourteenth-century Italian mustacchio, which goes back through Medieval Latin mustacchium and Medieval Greek moustakion to the Hellenistic Greek mustax, meaning upper lip.
The earliest depictions come from Egypt's Old Kingdom, around 2649 to 2130 BC; a statue of the Fourth Dynasty prince Rahotep, from about 2550 BC, shows one, and stone razors had made shaving possible since Neolithic times. The Greek historian Diodorus Siculus wrote that Gaulish nobles shaved their cheeks but let the moustache grow until it covered the mouth. In the early Middle Ages the faceplate of the Sutton Hoo helmet carries one, and Welsh leaders and English royals such as Edward of Wales often wore a moustache with no beard. In the West its popularity peaked in the 1880s and 1890s, alongside a vogue for military virtues.
Meanings vary by culture. In many twentieth-century Arab countries a moustache suggested power, a beard Islamic traditionalism, and a clean-shaven face liberal, secular leanings. The moustache is a religious symbol for male followers of the Yarsan faith, whereas Confucian influence in ancient China meant facial and head hair were traditionally left uncut. Research suggests facial hair becomes more or less common in step with how saturated the marriage market is, perhaps because its thickness hints at age or androgen levels.
Keeping one means shaving the chin and cheeks so it never becomes a full beard, with help from wax, nets, brushes, combs, and scissors; in the Middle East, moustache transplants by follicular unit extraction are a growing trend. The longest belongs to Ram Singh Chauhan of India, whose moustache was measured at 4.29 metres on an Italian television show in Rome on 4 March 2010. The 2007 World Beard and Moustache Championships judged six moustache categories, among them the Dalí, with narrow points curving steeply upward, named after Salvador Dalí.
Source: Moustache
