Meanings
- obsoleteIn a rough and disagreeable manner; against the grain.
And yet hee’l smile, but then beware, For sure it is against the hair;
1663 (indicated as 1664), [Samuel Butler], “The Second Part of Hudibras”, in Hudibras. The First and Second Parts. […], London: […] John Martyn and Henry Herringman, […], published 1678, →OCLC; republished in A[lfred] R[ayney] Waller, editor, Hudibras: Written in the Time of the Late Wars, Cambridge, Cambridgeshire: University Press, 1905, →OCLC, page 742 more examples
He is the wiser man, master doctor: he is a curer of souls, and you a curer of bodies; if you should fight, you go against the hair of your professions.
c. 1597 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Merry Wiues of Windsor”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene iii]But his Army loved him not; all went unwillingly with him, and against the hair.
1644, David Hume, The History of the Houses of Douglas and Angus, Edinburgh, Part II, p. 248
Cite this entry
against the hair. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 5, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/against%20the%20hair
“against the hair.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/against%20the%20hair. Accessed November 5, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “against the hair,” accessed November 5, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/against%20the%20hair.
Source: against the hair on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.