Word.ws English Dictionary

hairshirt

UK/ˈhɛəʃɜːt//ˈhɛɹʃɝt/

hairshirt noun: a shirt made of haircloth; especially one worn by ascetics or the penitent.

hairshirt: a shirt made of haircloth; especially one worn by ascetics or the penitent
Image: Anupam, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Noun

hairshirt (plural hairshirts)

  1. A shirt made of haircloth; especially one worn by ascetics or the penitent.
    • He is practically a total abstainer and I can affirm that he sleeps on a straw litter and eats the most Spartan food, cold dried grocer’s peas. He wears a hairshirt winter and summer and scourges himself every Saturday.1922 February 2, James Joyce, “[Episode 15: Circe]”, in Ulysses, Paris: Shakespeare and Company […], →OCLC, part II [Odyssey], page 466
  2. (figuratively) A state of penitence and humility.
    • And when he went on to say, “The curse must be within ourselves,” Muir bequeathed us a hairshirt: the guilty conscience that plagues so many of us when we see what we are doing to the rest of nature.1981 June 21, Joseph Kastner, “Whole Earth Controversy”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, page 71

Adjective

hairshirt (not comparable)

  1. (relational) Advocating or adopting a relatively ascetic lifestyle, especially for environmentalist reasons.
    • The gloomy contentions of “hairshirt economists” who want more public and less private spending were assailed today by Robert W. Sarnoff, chairman of the National Broadcasting Company.1960 October 13, “‘Hairshirt Economists’ Scored For Pushing Public Spending”, in The New York Times, page 51
    • No hair-shirt ascetiscism, but far less consumerism, less shopping for the sake of shopping, less conspicuous consumption, less waste. There will be less trade, but it will be more judicious, and there will be more 'self-reliance' in energy, food and manufacturing.2005 November 6, Juliette Jowit, “Porritt warns greens to mend 'negative' ways”, in The Observer, →ISSN

Synonyms of hairshirt

Forms of hairshirt

pluralhairshirts
alternative formhair shirt
alternative formhair-shirt

Origin of hairshirt

From hair + shirt.

Words formed from hairshirt

Questions about hairshirt

What does hairshirt mean?
Hairshirt means a shirt made of haircloth; especially one worn by ascetics or the penitent.
What part of speech is hairshirt?
Hairshirt can be a noun or an adjective.
How do you pronounce hairshirt?
Hairshirt is pronounced /ˈhɛəʃɜːt/ (UK).
What is the plural of hairshirt?
The plural of hairshirt is hairshirts.

Words near hairshirt in the dictionary

  1. hairscale
  2. hairscales
  3. hairsedge
  4. hairshaft
  5. hairshafts
  6. hairshirt
  7. hairshirted
  8. hairshirts
  9. Hairsine
  10. hairslide
  11. hairslides

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: hairshirt (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-hairshirt.wav.

Cite this entry: “hairshirt.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/hairshirt. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.