Titus cut

{{Short description|Hairstyle}}

File:Madame Fouler, comtesse de Relingue.jpg

A Titus cut or coiffure à la Titus was a hairstyle for men and women popular at the end of the 18th century in France and England. The style consisted of a short layered cut, typically with curls.{{cite book |last1=Rifelj |first1=Carol |title=Coiffures: Hair in Nineteenth-century French Literature and Culture |date=2010 |publisher=University of Delaware Press |location=Newark |isbn=0874130999 |pages=34–40}} It was supposedly popularized in 1791 by the French actor François-Joseph Talma who played Titus in a Parisian production of Voltaire's Brutus.{{cite book |last1=Ribeiro |first1=Aileen |title=Fashion in the French Revolution |date=1988 |publisher=Batsford |location=London |isbn=0713453524 |page=68}}{{cite thesis |last=Larson |first=Jessica |date=20 April 2013 |title=Usurping Masculinity: The Gender Dynamics of the coiffure à la Titus in Revolutionary France |url=https://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/handle/2027.42/98928/jjlars.pdf |degree=BA |publisher=University of Michigan |page=23 |access-date=2024-03-24}}

The Titus cut was considered a radical departure from the large elaborate hairstyles and wigs that were popular during the last quarter of the 18th century. As a simple "classical" style, free from aristocratic excess, it was associated with the French Revolution and popular among those who supported it.{{cite thesis |last=Larson |first=Jessica |date=20 April 2013 |title=Usurping Masculinity: The Gender Dynamics of the coiffure à la Titus in Revolutionary France |url=https://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/handle/2027.42/98928/jjlars.pdf |degree=BA |publisher=University of Michigan |pages=11–13 |access-date=2024-03-24}} Although initially a men's style, it was soon adopted by women as well. The {{Lang|fr|Journal de Paris}} reported in 1802 that "more than half of elegant women were wearing their hair or wig à la Titus." The style spread to England as well, where it was often called coiffure à la guillotine in reference to the beheadings of the French Revolution.{{cite book |last1=de Courtais |first1=Georgine |title=Women's Hats, Headdresses and Hairstyles |date=2006 |publisher=Dover Publications |isbn=0486136698 |page=96}}{{cite thesis |last=Larson |first=Jessica |date=20 April 2013 |title=Usurping Masculinity: The Gender Dynamics of the coiffure à la Titus in Revolutionary France |url=https://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/handle/2027.42/98928/jjlars.pdf |degree=BA |publisher=University of Michigan |page=24 |access-date=2024-03-24}} Although the style remained popular into the 19th century, by the 1810s it had fallen out of fashion.