Elvis Presley's hairstyle was named after a woman - the favorite mistress of Louis XV. What was it?

The King of Rock and Roll's signature look, with its high volume and swept-back front, has a surprisingly aristocratic and feminine origin. This classic hairstyle is named the pompadour, a direct reference to a powerful figure in the 18th-century French court. The style's namesake was Jeanne Antoinette Poisson, who is better known by her title, the Marquise de Pompadour.

As the official chief mistress of King Louis XV from 1745 until her death in 1764, Madame de Pompadour was far more than a royal companion. She was a major political advisor, a prominent tastemaker, and an influential patron of the arts and Enlightenment philosophers. She famously wore her hair brushed up and back from her forehead, creating a voluminous silhouette that became fashionable among the European nobility.

The hairstyle was revived for women in the late 19th century before being adopted by a new generation of rebellious young men in the 1950s. While other stars like James Dean and Little Richard sported the look, it was Elvis Presley who made the men's pompadour an iconic and enduring symbol of rock and roll, forever linking the style of a French king's favorite courtier to a new American king.