pompadour means A women's hairstyle in which the hair is swept upwards from the face and worn high over the forehead. It carries an Arena rating of 1530, earned across 6 head-to-head judged battles.
Among words judged in Lexicurio's Arena, pompadour ranks #791 of 17,104 for Most Storied Words, #881 of 17,127 for Words That Escaped Their Books, #1,912 of 17,127 for Most Vivid Words, #2,465 of 17,140 for Most Whimsical Words.
pompadour is pronounced /ˈpɒmpədʊə/.
Why “pompadour” is a great word
A hairstyle in which the hair is swept upward and worn high over the forehead. From French Pompadour, after Jeanne Antoinette Poisson, Marquise de Pompadour (1721–1764), mistress of King Louis XV of France; first recorded in English use in the 1750s. Unlike a quiff, a modest tuft of front hair, or a bouffant, an all-around puffed volume, the pompadour is a deliberate architectural feat—a structured elevation swept from the roots. It is the gleaming crest of a rockabilly rebel, the lacquered cliff on a 1950s matinee idol, and the powdered cloud framing an aristocratic face in a Fragonard portrait—a vanity built upon the scalp, declaring its presence against the pull of gravity and time.
Etymology
From French Pompadour, after Madame de Pompadour (1721–1764), mistress of Louis XV.
noun
- A women's hairstyle in which the hair is swept upwards from the face and worn high over the forehead.
- A men's hairstyle of the 1950s.e.g.“Squat and perspiring, with a low pompadour and a thin black mustache, he was inevitably disheveled by evening.” — 2019, Colson Whitehead, The Nickel Boys, Fleet, page 17:
- A crimson or pink colour.e.g.“[…] head, neck, and whole under parts fine but very deep crimson or pompadour-colour […]” — 1812, George Shaw, James Francis Stephens, General Zoology: pt. 1. Aves, page 409:
- A corsage with low square neck.
- A pattern for silk, with leaves and flowers in pink, blue, and gold.
- A member of the 56th (West Essex) Regiment of Foot, an infantry regiment in the British Army, active from 1755 to 1881.
verb
- To style hair into a pompadour
Definitions & examples from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 3.0).
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