goatee

English

Etymology

From goat +‎ -ee (diminutive suffix), referring to the tuft of hair on the chin of many domestic goats.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ɡəʊˈtiː/

• Audio (Southern England)

  (file)

• (US) IPA^(key): /ˌɡoʊˈtiː/
• Rhymes: -iː

Noun

goatee (plural goatees)

1. A beard trimmed to grow only at the center of the chin.

   Coordinate term: soul patch

   • 1845 February, “Editors' Table”, in The Williams Monthly Miscellany, volume 1, number 8, page 367:

     One person sports a goatee, the hair refusing to grow on the sides of his physiognomy; the chin of another is as smooth as a baby's cheek,—he contents himself with a modest moustache and a faint attempt at an imperial; while a few of the upper classes rejoice in all the varieties.

   • 1906 January–October, Joseph Conrad, chapter III, in The Secret Agent: A Simple Tale, London: Methuen & Co., , published 1907, →OCLC; The Secret Agent: A Simple Tale (Collection of British Authors; 3995), copyright edition, Leipzig: Bernhard Tauchnitz, 1907, →OCLC, page 44:

     The terrorist, as he called himself, was old and bald, with a narrow, snow-white wisp of a goatee hanging limply from his chin.

   • 1925 July – 1926 May, A[rthur] Conan Doyle, “(please specify the chapter number)”, in The Land of Mist (eBook no. 0601351h.html), Australia: Project Gutenberg Australia, published April 2019:

     "Yes, sir, behind you. He is a man of middle size, rather inclined to shortness. He is old, over sixty, with white hair, curved nose and a white, small beard of the variety that is called goatee."

Derived terms

• goateed

Translations

Further reading

• goatee on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• goatees on Wikimedia Commons.Wikimedia Commons