60 Fun Facts About Beards

Beard growth in men is driven by the stimulation of hair follicles by which hormone?

The same hormone also promotes balding, which is why a thick beard and a thinning scalp so often arrive together.

Which naturalist first proposed, in The Descent of Man, that sexual selection explains men's beards?

Modern biologists broadly agree, and studies find that a majority of women rate bearded men as more attractive.

What was the metal false beard worn by Egyptian kings and queens regnant called?

It was tied on with a ribbon over the head and a gold chin strap, and the fashion lasted from about 3000 to 1580 BCE.

How did the Spartans punish cowards, according to ancient sources?

To the Greeks a smooth face signalled effeminacy, so a half-shaved beard was a walking humiliation.

Which Roman general is said to have been the first Roman to shave his beard?

Shaving caught on so fast afterwards that a smooth chin became a way of looking Roman rather than Greek.

According to Dio Cassius, who was the first Roman emperor to grow a full beard?

Plutarch claimed he grew it to hide facial scars; either way, emperors stayed bearded on their coins until Constantine.

When Nero was first shaved, he put the hair in a pearl-set golden box dedicated to which god?

A young Roman's first shave was celebrated as a festival marking the start of manhood, and the clippings were consecrated to a god.

Which Stoic philosopher wrote that he would rather be beheaded than shave off his beard?

He put the exchange in his Discourses: told to shave or lose his head, the philosopher answers, 'If it will do you any good, behead me.'

Which Roman emperor had the hair and beard of the philosopher Apollonius of Tyana forcibly shaved off?

The same emperor banished all philosophers from Italy under threat of execution, forcing Epictetus to flee Rome.

The Lombards, a Germanic people who settled in Italy, took their name from what?

Longobards means Long Beards, and Otto the Great was said to swear by his own beard, which reached his chest.

Tacitus wrote that a young Catti man could not shave or cut his hair until he had done what?

The Gaelic Celts of Scotland and Ireland took a similar view: a man without facial hair was thought dishonourable.

In medieval Europe, pulling off another man's beard carried the same punishment as which crime?

Simply holding another man's beard was a serious offence that had to be righted in a duel.

In The Lay of the Cid, El Cid is 'the one with the ___ beard'. Which word fills the gap?

To a medieval knight the beard displayed virility and honour, while the Catholic clergy were required to shave as a symbol of celibacy.

In what year did Peter the Great levy his tax on beards?

He had already ordered men to shave in 1698; the tax was the follow-up for holdouts, part of a push to make Russia look Western European.

Which ruler formally repealed the Russian beard tax in 1772?

The tax raised an average of just 3,588 rubles a year from 1705 to 1708, so its repeal cost the treasury almost nothing.

What did Russians who paid the beard tax have to carry as proof?

The token showed a Russian eagle on one side and the lower half of a face with nose, whiskers and beard on the other.

Which kingdom introduced a 'no-beard tax' in 1936, charging men who were clean-shaven?

It inverted the usual idea of a beard tax: here the fee was for not growing one.

Which bearded French king got papal approval in the early 1500s to tax priests' beards?

The tax split the church: wealthy court clerics could afford to keep their beards while poor village priests could not.

A persistent legend says which bearded English king introduced a tax on beards?

The National Archives has no record of any such tax ever being instituted, so the story remains a legend.

Who was the last pope to wear a beard, dying in 1700?

Every pope from Clement VII, who let his beard grow during the 1527 sack of Rome, to this one wore facial hair; none has since.

Which pope grew a beard in 1511–12 as a sign of mourning for the loss of the city of Bologna?

He is regarded as the first pope of relatively modern times to wear a beard, though he only kept it for a while.

Which English sea captain claimed in 1587 to have 'singed the King of Spain's beard'?

The 16th century was peak beard: Henry VIII, Charles V and Francis I all succeeded clean-shaven predecessors.

Every U.S. president since which man, who took office in 1913, has been clean-shaven?

Between 1861 and 1913 almost every president wore a beard or moustache; only Andrew Johnson and William McKinley broke the run.

Who was the last U.S. president to wear any kind of facial hair?

His moustache left the White House in 1913, and no successor has worn so much as a moustache since.

Who in 2025 became the first US vice president with facial hair since Charles Curtis in 1933?

He was also the first member of a winning presidential ticket to wear facial hair since Thomas Dewey ran, and lost, in 1948.

Which 11-year-old girl wrote to Lincoln in October 1860 urging him to grow a beard?

She wrote from Westfield, New York, and the newly bearded president-elect stopped to meet her there on his inaugural journey in 1861.

Which Civil War general's surname, with its syllables swapped, gave us the word 'sideburns'?

His strips of cheek hair joined his moustache while his chin stayed shaven; the style was first called 'burnsides'.

The Van Dyke beard is named after a 17th-century painter of which nationality?

Anthony van Dyck wore the style himself and painted many sitters with it, including Charles I of England.

The Van Dyke beard is sometimes called a 'Charlie' after which monarch, who was painted wearing one?

After the Restoration some men, called 'vow-beards', swore to keep the style until the king wore it again.

A chin curtain beard, covering the chin with no moustache, is also known by which president's name?

The style is also called a Shenandoah or a spade, and its cousin the chinstrap runs from the sideburns to under the chin.

Which composer's name is given to a short rounded beard with a prominent moustache?

By the end of the 20th century this closely clipped style, often with an integrated moustache, had become relatively common.

Which German composer is listed among the historical figures who wore a neckbeard?

The style, with chin and jawline shaven and hair only on the neck, was also worn by Nero and Henry David Thoreau.

A wide, full beard with a rounded bottom and moustache is named after which Italian revolutionary?

He was one of many bearded statesmen of the post-1848 era, alongside Disraeli, Dickens, Marx and Verdi.

The phrase 'five o'clock shadow' was coined around 1942 in advertising for which razor-blade brand?

Madison Avenue marketing helped make the clean-shaven face the only acceptable look for decades, until the beatniks and hippies brought beards back.

Which NHL team is credited with starting the playoff beard tradition in the early 1980s?

Mike Bossy said teammate Butch Goring probably started it, and two Swedish teammates may have picked the habit up from Bjorn Borg's unshaven Wimbledons.

Under owner George Steinbrenner, which baseball team banned long hair and any facial hair below the lip?

The rule outlived him under Hank and Hal Steinbrenner, and former coaches Willie Randolph and Joe Girardi exported it to the Mets and Marlins.

Which MLB team's long-standing clean-shaven rule ended after Marge Schott sold the club in 1999?

The policy banned beards, long sideburns and moustaches alike.

How much did a ticket cost bearded fans on the 2013 Red Sox's Dollar Beard Night?

That team had at least 12 players with facial hair, from David Ortiz's trim beard to the shaggy looks of Jonny Gomes and Mike Napoli.

Reliever Brian Wilson grew his famous beard, unshaven since the 2010 All-Star Game, with which team?

MLB Fan Cave built an interactive 'Journey Inside Brian Wilson's Beard', and the club gave away replica beards to fans.

In which country was the first World Beard and Moustache Championships held, in 1990?

It took place in Hofen an der Enz, and since 2007 the championships have run every two years in odd-numbered years.

In which US city were the 2017 World Beard and Moustache Championships, the largest ever with 738 competitors, held?

The 2017 event was also the first to include four 'craft beard' categories for women, known as whiskerinas.

How far beyond the upper lip may a 'natural moustache' extend under World Beard and Moustache rules?

Other moustache classes include the English, the Dali, the Imperial and the big, bushy Hungarian.

In which city did 30 men organise the 2004 moustache-growing event that became the Movember Foundation?

The next year nearly 500 people raised over $40,000 for the Prostate Cancer Foundation of Australia, then its largest ever donation.

To which museum was Hans Langseth's 5.33-metre beard, the longest ever recorded, donated in 1967?

Langseth started growing it at 19 and never shaved again, touring the United States with a freak show in later life.

The lammergeier, the only known vertebrate with a 70–90% bone diet, is better known as what?

It drops bones too big to swallow from 50 to 150 metres onto rocks to smash them open for the marrow.

Bearded dragons are native to which country?

They wave a hand to signal submission and bob their heads to show dominance.

On a turkey, what exactly is the 'beard'?

It usually lies flat and hidden, but stands out several centimetres when the bird is displaying.

Amish and Hutterite men traditionally shave until which life event, then grow a beard?

The style is distinctive too: a full beard with the moustache shaved, serving as a visual marker of marital status.

In Sikhism, keeping the hair and beard uncut is which of the Five Ks?

Guru Gobind Singh, the tenth Guru, made unshorn hair a mandatory article of faith for baptised Sikhs.

According to Twelver Shia custom, a beard should not exceed what length?

Trimming is allowed but shaving is considered haram in that tradition.

In Greek art, Zeus and Poseidon are always shown with full beards, but which Olympian never is?

Hermes was also bearded in early art until a beardless youth replaced him in the 5th century BCE.

Why have professional airline pilots traditionally been required to be clean-shaven?

Firefighters face the same rule for their breathing apparatus, though some airlines have relaxed the ban after newer studies.

Which Japanese city banned beards for its male municipal employees in May 2010?

It sits in Gunma Prefecture, and the ban stands in contrast to a U.S. appeals court that found compulsory shaving discriminatory.

How many of the figures in Leonardo da Vinci's The Last Supper are bearded?

Christian art has shown Jesus with a long beard since the 3rd century, while John the Apostle is usually painted clean-shaven to stress his youth.

In the Homeric epics, touching another man's beard was a common way of doing what?

To the ancient Greeks the beard was a badge of virility, and it was only shaved as a sign of mourning.

Whose example made shaving fashionable in Greece near the end of the fourth century BCE?

Before that, shaving was rare in Athens; Rome only followed suit at the end of the third century BCE, after which a clean face became almost compulsory for a respectable citizen.

According to Julius Caesar, the Britons wore no beard except where?

Late Hellenistic sculptures likewise show Celts with long hair and moustaches but no beards.

What did Mesopotamian men use to shape their beards into elaborate ringlets and tiers?

Sumerians, Assyrians, Babylonians and Chaldeans all lavished care on oiling and dressing their beards.

After which upheaval did beards become far more popular among Europe's monarchs and statesmen?

Franz Joseph I, Napoleon III, Alexander II and William I all grew beards, as did Disraeli, Dickens, Garibaldi and Marx.

In mid-Tudor England, a beard on a clergyman was widely understood as a gesture of what?

Late medieval priests were clean-shaven; Luther set the precedent during his exile and virtually all the continental reformers grew beards.