toupee
English
Alternative forms
- toupe, toupée, toupet
Etymology
1727, from French toupet (“small tuft of hair, forelock”), from Middle French toupet (“small tuft of hair, forelock”), from Old French toupet (“small tuft of hair, forelock”), diminutive of toupe, top (“tuft of hair”), from Frankish *topp (“summit, crest, tuft of hair”), from Proto-Germanic *tuppaz (“summit, crest, tuft of hair”). Cognate with Old Dutch topp (“top”) (Dutch top), Old Frisian top (“summit, crest, tuft of hair”), Old English top (“summit, crest, tuft of hair”), Old High German zopf (“end, summit, tuft of hair”), Old Norse toppr (“tuft of hair, forelock”). More at top.
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /tuːˈpeɪ/
Audio (UK) (file) - Rhymes: -eɪ
Noun
toupee (plural toupees)
- A wig of false hair worn to cover a bald spot, especially as worn by a man.
- (obsolete) A little tuft; a curl or artificial lock of hair.
- (obsolete) A small wig, or a toppiece of a wig.
- 1860, George Eliot, The Mill on the Floss
- Her powdered hair is turned backward over a toupee.
- 1860, George Eliot, The Mill on the Floss
Part or all of this entry has been imported from the 1913 edition of Webster’s Dictionary, which is now free of copyright and hence in the public domain. The imported definitions may be significantly out of date, and any more recent senses may be completely missing.
(See the entry for toupee in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913)
Derived terms
- toupee fallacy
Translations
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