Grrrrrrrr -eetings .   here is a fun and fantastic addition to your costume gear, or the perfect gift for any fan.

From the Renaissance to the present day

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  Friedrich Engels exhibiting a full moustache and beard that was a common style among Europeans of the 19th century.

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  Johann Strauss II with a large beard, moustache, and sideburns.

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  Maryland Governor Thomas Swann with a long goatee. Such beards were common around the time of the American Civil War.

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  Emperor Meiji of Japan wore a full beard and moustache during most of his reign.

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  Johannes Brahms with a large beard and moustache.

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  Walt Whitman with a large beard and moustache.

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  English cricketer W. G. Grace with his trademark beard.

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  Cuban revolutionaries Che Guevara (left) and Fidel Castro (right) with a full beard.

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  The Ned Kelly beard was named after the bushranger, Ned Kelly.

Most Chinese emperors of the Ming dynasty (1368-1644) appear with beards or mustaches in portraits.

In the 15th century, most European men were clean-shaven. 16th-century beards were allowed to grow to an amazing length (see the portraits of John Knox, Bishop Gardiner, Cardinal Pole and Thomas Cranmer). Some beards of this time were the Spanish spade beard, the English square cut beard, the forked beard, and the stiletto beard. In 1587 Francis Drake claimed, in a figure of speech, to have singed the King of Spain's beard.

During the Chinese Qing dynasty (1644-1911), the ruling Manchu minority were either clean-shaven or at most wore mustaches, in contrast to the Han majority who still wore beards in keeping with the Confucian ideal.

In the beginning of the 17th century, the size of beards decreased in urban circles of Western Europe. In the second half of the century, being clean-shaven gradually became more common again, so much so that in 1698, Peter the Great of Russia ordered men to shave off their beards, and in 1705 levied a tax on beards in order to bring Russian society more in line with contemporary Western Europe.^[44]

During the early 19th century most men, particularly amongst the nobility and upper classes, went clean-shaven. There was, however, a dramatic shift in the beard's popularity during the 1850s, with it becoming markedly more popular.^[45] Consequently, beards were adopted by many leaders, such as Alexander III of Russia, Napoleon III of France and Frederick III of Germany, as well as many leading statesmen and cultural figures, such as Benjamin Disraeli, Charles Dickens, Giuseppe Garibaldi, Karl Marx, and Giuseppe Verdi. This trend can be recognised in the United States of America, where the shift can be seen amongst the post-Civil War presidents. Before Abraham Lincoln, no President had a beard;^[46] after Lincoln until Woodrow Wilson, every President except Andrew Johnson and William McKinley had either a beard or a moustache.

The beard became linked in this period with notions of masculinity and male courage.^[45] The resulting popularity has contributed to the stereotypical Victorian male figure in the popular mind, the stern figure clothed in black whose gravitas is added to by a heavy beard.

In China, the revolution of 1911 and subsequent May Fourth Movement of 1919 led the Chinese to idealize the West as more modern and progressive than themselves. This included the realm of fashion, and Chinese men began shaving their faces and cutting their hair short.

By the early-twentieth century, beards began a slow decline in popularity. Although retained by some prominent figures who were young men in the Victorian period (like Sigmund Freud), most men who retained facial hair during the 1920s and 1930s limited themselves to a moustache or a goatee (such as with Marcel Proust, Albert Einstein, Vladimir Lenin, Leon Trotsky, Adolf Hitler, and Joseph Stalin). In the United States, meanwhile, popular movies portrayed heroes with clean-shaven faces and "crew cuts". Concurrently, the psychological mass marketing of Edward Bernays and Madison Avenue was becoming prevalent. The Gillette Safety Razor Company was one of these marketers' early clients. These events conspired to popularize short hair and clean-shaven faces as the only acceptable style for decades to come. The few men who wore the beard or portions of the beard during this period were usually either old, Central European, members of a religious sect that required it, or in academia.

The beard was reintroduced to mainstream society by the counterculture, firstly with the "beatniks" in the 1950s, and then with the hippie movement of the mid-1960s. Following the Vietnam War, beards exploded in popularity. In the mid-late 1960s and throughout the 1970s, beards were worn by hippies and businessmen alike. Popular musicians like The Beatles, Barry White, The Beach Boys, Jim Morrison (lead singer of The Doors) and the male members of Peter, Paul, and Mary, among many others, wore full beards. The trend of seemingly ubiquitous beards in American culture subsided in the mid-1980s.

By the end of the 20th century, the closely clipped Verdi beard, often with a matching integrated moustache, had become relatively common. From the 1990s onward, fashion in the United States has generally trended toward either a goatee, Van Dyke, or a closely cropped full beard undercut on the throat. By 2010, the fashionable length approached a "two-day shadow".^[47] The 2010s decade also saw the full beard become fashionable again amongst young men and a huge increase in the sales of male grooming products.^[48]

One stratum of American society where facial hair was long rare is in government and politics. The last President of the United States to wear any type of facial hair was William Howard Taft, who was in office from 1909-1913.^[49][50] The last Vice President of the United States to wear any facial hair was Charles Curtis, who was in office from 1929-1933. Both of whom wore moustaches, but the last President of the United States to wear a beard was Benjamin Harrison; who was in office from 1889-1893. The last member of the United States Supreme Court with a full beard was Chief Justice Charles Evans Hughes, who served on the Court until 1941. Since 2015 a growing number of male political figures have worn beards in office, including Speaker of the House Paul Ryan, and Senators Ted Cruz and Tom Cotton.

In religion

Beards also play an important role in some religions.

In Greek mythology and art, Zeus and Poseidon are always portrayed with beards, but Apollo never is. A bearded Hermes was replaced with the more familiar beardless youth in the 5th century BC. Zoroaster, the 11th/10th century BC era founder of Zoroastrianism is almost always depicted with a beard. In Norse mythology, Thor the god of thunder is portrayed wearing a red beard.

Christianity

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  Basilios Bessarion's beard contributed to his defeat in the papal conclave of 1455.^[51]

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  Pope Paul III

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  Thomas Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury and architect of the English Reformation, wore a long beard in his later years.

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  Thomas Bramwell Welch was a Methodist minister.

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  Roman Catholic Capuchin friar, Blessed Solanus Casey (1870-1957).

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  Russian Orthodox Archbishop Saint Luka (Voyno-Yasenetsky) (1877-1961).

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  An Amish man with a Shenandoah beard.

Iconography and art dating from the 4th century onward almost always portray Jesus with a beard. In paintings and statues most of the Old Testament Biblical characters such as Moses and Abraham and Jesus' New Testament disciples such as St Peter appear with beards, as does John the Baptist. However, Western European art generally depicts John the Apostle as clean-shaven, to emphasize his relative youth. Eight of the figures portrayed in the painting entitled The Last Supper by Leonardo da Vinci are bearded. Mainstream Christianity holds Isaiah Chapter 50: Verse 6 as a prophecy of Christ's crucifixion, and as such, as a description of Christ having his beard plucked by his tormentors.