How does one describe beard length?  Inches might work, or for some feet.  However, mathematics seems sterile for something as ontological as a beard.

Today a post on the Facebooks caught my attention.  It was posted by beards.org and featured a beard scale put together by a woman named Danielle to describe her husband’s beard.  Here was her scale:

1.  Sexy stubble

2.  Sea Captain

3.  Prisoner of war

4.  Homeless person

5.  Wizard

I like her little scale.  It is creative.  However, I’m not certain about the “prisoner of war” because, in all honesty, that is a rather nasty business.  It also strikes me that a “homeless person” and “wizard” are only differentiated by the amount of alcohol on the clothing of the beard wearer.  Unless of course said wizard is Gandalf, who very likely might be intoxicated as well.  It might be possible to list, in a biblical context, the wizard beard as the prophet beard.

I think I would take her scale and modify it, just a bit.  I would move “sea captain” down to three and put “bard” at number 2.  By “bard” I mean that wonderful full beard of the academic, writer, and scholar.  A bard’s beard is not as long as a sea captains beard, for it is neatly trimmed and manicured to display its glory alongside tweed and elbow patches.  Then I would add, what might be called, the professional’s beard.  This is the kind of beard that looks good in a uniform or a suit and that fits in at the office.

So, then my modified list would look like this:

1.  Sexy Stubble

2.  Bard

3.  The Pro

4.  Sea Captain

5.  Homeless Person

6.  Wizard (Prophet)

So now, we go to examples and possible new naming.  It strikes me that we could interchange these bearded labels with celebrities or actors in movies.  So, now the list becomes:

1. The George Clooney

2.  The Freud

3.  The Riker

4.  Red October

5.  The Mel

6.  Moses

The obvious of course is that these reference full beards, not van dykes or goatees or the miniscule and mindless soul patch.

pictures from:  www.giorgiobrutini.com (Clooney),
en.wikipedia.org  (Freud),
draggpost.com (Riker),
nicksbeardblog.blogspot.com (Connery), heebmagazine.com (Gibson),entertainment.howstuffworks.com (Michelangelo’s Moses)