Beard facts for kids

Some kinds of beards.

A beard is the hair growing on the lower part of a man's face.

The hair that grows on the upper lip of some men is a mustache. When a man has hair only below the lower lip and above the chin, it is called a soul patch. Some men have a lot of hair and a big beard, and some have very little. In the modern world, many men shave part or all of their beards, or cut their beard so it does not get very long. Women can also have beards, but it is less common.

Some animals also have hair like this, and people sometimes also call this hair a beard.

Images for kids

Charles Darwin
Phoenicians or the ancestors of the Lebanese gave great attention to the beard, as can be seen in their sculptures.
Bearded Akkadian mask featuring characteristic curls, presumed to represent either Sargon the Elder or his grandson Naram-Sin
Close-up of one of the Lamassu beard relief in Gate of All Nations in Perspolis (south of Iran).
Fath-Ali Shah, the second Qajar Shah of Persia had a long beard.
A coin depicting a cleanly shaven Alexander the Great.
Charles IV, Holy Roman Emperor.
The Yongle Emperor of Ming (1402-1424)
Johann Strauss II with a large beard, moustache, and sideburns.
Mid 19th Century Photograph of a California man with an 8-foot beard
Emperor Meiji of Japan wore a full beard and moustache during most of his reign.
Johannes Brahms with large beard and moustache.
French political Jean Jaurès with a full beard and moustache.
Friedrich Engels exhibiting a full moustache and beard that was a common style among Europeans of the nineteenth century.
Maryland Governor Thomas Swann with a long goatee. Such beards were common around the time of the American Civil War.
Romanian fisherman with a beard, 1941.
Moche ceramic vessels representing bearded men. Larco Museum Collection. Lima, Peru.
Cuban revolutionaries Che Guevara (left) and Fidel Castro (right) with a full beard.
Basilios Bessarion's beard contributed to his defeat in the papal conclave of 1455.
Many early LDS Church leaders (such as Brigham Young, pictured) wore beards.
An example of an Ottoman-style beard (Sultan Selim III).
A young bearded Muslim male
An example of a Safavid-style beard (Shah Ismail I).
Orthodox Jew in Jerusalem with an unshaved beard and payot (sidelocks)
A Sikh man with full beard
Brian Wilson's beard in 2011
James Harden's beard
Silas Hocking, bearded
Henry David Thoreau with neckbeard
Emperor Pedro II of Brazil
Bornean bearded pigs
A bearded saki