Lord Dundreary is a character of the 1858 British play Our American Cousin

Our American Cousin

Our American Cousin is an 1858 play in three acts by English playwright Tom Taylor. The play is a farce whose plot is based on the introduction of an awkward, boorish but honest American, Asa Trenchard, to his aristocratic English relatives when he goes to England to claim the family estate...

by Tom Taylor

Tom Taylor

Tom Taylor was an English dramatist, critic, biographer, public servant, and editor of Punch magazine...

. He is the personification of a good-natured, brainless aristocrat. The role was created on stage by Edward Askew Sothern

Edward Askew Sothern

Edward Askew Sothern was an English actor known for his comic roles in Britain and America, particularly Lord Dundreary in Our American Cousin.- Early years :...

. The most famous scene involved Dundreary reading a letter from his even sillier brother. Sothern expanded the scene considerably in performance. A number of spin-off works were also created, including a play about the brother.

His name gave rise to two eponym

Eponym

An eponym is the name of a person or thing, whether real or fictitious, after which a particular place, tribe, era, discovery, or other item is named or thought to be named...

s rarely heard today: Dundrearies were a particular style of facial hair taking the form of exaggeratedly bushy sideburns. "Dundrearyisms" were expanded malapropism

Malapropism

A malapropism is an act of misusing or the habitual misuse of similar sounding words, especially with humorous results. An example is Yogi Berra's statement: "Texas has a lot of electrical votes," rather than "electoral votes".-Etymology:...

s in the form of twisted and nonsensical aphorisms in the style of Lord Dundreary (e.g. "birds of a feather gather no moss"). These enjoyed a brief vogue.

Charles Kingsley

Charles Kingsley

Charles Kingsley was an English priest of the Church of England, university professor, historian and novelist, particularly associated with the West Country and northeast Hampshire.-Life and character:...

wrote an essay entitled "Speech of Lord Dundreary in Section D, on Friday Last, On the Great Hippocampus Question", a parody of debates about evolutionary theory in the form of a nonsensical speech supposed to have been written by Dundreary.