Burnsides

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. Facial hair grown down the sides of a man's face in front of the ears, sometimes extending along the jaw
2. Long hair on the cheeks worn in front of the ears, often trimmed and kept in place as part of a beard style
3. Whiskers that grow from the temples down toward the jawline, frequently left without a full beard or moustache

Etymology: Ambrose Everett Burnside was a Union general in the American Civil War, and he is the reason a bushy style of facial hair carries his name. The sideburns he wore were so full and distinctive that the style came to be called "burnsides" after him, and the word was later shortened and reversed in a way that gave us "sideburns." The plural form "burnsides" is the older name for the whiskers themselves, with the singular "burnside" used for an individual example of the style. Because the word was built on a surname and never drew on a classical language, its history is simply that of a nickname that stuck. Its origin lies entirely in the general's appearance rather than in any older word, which makes it one of the few everyday terms in English that began as a person's name attached to a personal feature.

Synonyms: sideburns, sideboards