moustache

English
Man with moustache and sideburns
The mustache of Charlie Chaplin

Alternative forms

Etymology

Used in English since the 16th century. Via French moustache from Italian mostaccio, from early Medieval Latin mustācium, from Byzantine Greek μουστάκιον (moustákion), diminutive of (Doric) Ancient Greek μύσταξ (mústax, “upper lip”), from Proto-Indo-European *mendʰ- (“to chew”). Replaced native English kemp (“moustache”), from Old English cenep.

Pronunciation

Noun

moustache (plural moustaches)

  1. A growth of facial hair between the nose and the upper lip.
    • 1907 August, Robert W[illiam] Chambers, chapter IX, in The Younger Set, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, →OCLC:
      “A tight little craft,” was Austin’s invariable comment on the matron; […]. ¶ Near her wandered her husband, orientally bland, invariably affable, and from time to time squinting sideways, as usual, in the ever-renewed expectation that he might catch a glimpse of his stiff, retroussé moustache.
    • 1959, Anthony Burgess, Beds in the East (The Malayan Trilogy), published 1972, page 555:
      Crabbe caught the eye of the oboist, an ancient man with dignified moustaches, and mimed that they were going round to the front, to watch the real thing, the shadows.
    For more quotations using this term, see Citations:moustache.

Usage notes

The plural forms moustaches and mustaches, while formerly popular equivalents for the facial hair on a man's upper lip, are now archaic, with the singular preferred.

Derived terms

Translations

See also

French

Etymology

Borrowed from Neapolitan mustaccio (compare Italian mostaccio), from early Medieval Latin mustāceum, from Byzantine Greek μουστάκιον (moustákion), diminutive from Ancient Greek μύσταξ (mústax).

Pronunciation
  • IPA(key): /mus.taʃ/
  • audio(file)
  • Homophone: moustaches

Noun

moustache f (plural moustaches)

  1. moustache, mustache
  2. (often in plural) whisker (of a cat)

Derived terms

Descendants
  • → English: moustache
  • → Swedish: mustasch

Further reading

Anagrams

Norman

Etymology

Borrowed from French moustache.

Noun

moustache f (plural moustaches)

  1. (Jersey) moustache
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