masquerade

From French mascarade (Spanish mascarada), from Italian mascarata (mascherata). See “mask”.

• IPA^(key): /mæskəˈreɪd/, /mɑːskəˈreɪd/
• Rhymes: -eɪd

• Audio (UK)

  (file)

masquerade (plural masquerades)

1. A party or assembly of people wearing masks, and amusing themselves with dancing, conversation, or other diversions.
   • Alexander Pope

     In courtly balls and midnight masquerades

2. (fandom slang) A cosplay event at which costumed attendees perform skits on a stage.
3. (obsolete) A dramatic performance by actors in masks; a mask. See “mask”
4. Acting or living under false pretenses; concealment of something by a false or unreal show; pretentious show; disguise.

   I was invited to the masquerade at their home.

   • Thomas de Quincey

     that masquerade of misrepresentation which invariably accompanied the political eloquence of Rome

5. (archaic) A Spanish entertainment in which squadrons of horses charge at each other, the riders fighting with bucklers and canes.

• costume party

masquerade (third-person singular simple present masquerades, present participle masquerading, simple past and past participle masqueraded)

1. (intransitive) To assemble in masks; to take part in a masquerade.

   I'm going to masquerade as the wikipede. What are you going to dress up as?

2. (intransitive) To frolic or disport in disguise; to make a pretentious show of being what one is not.

   He masqueraded as my friend until the truth finally came out.

   A freak took an ass in the head, and he goes into the woods, masquerading up and down in a lion's skin - Roger L'Estrange

3. (transitive) To conceal with masks; to disguise.
   • 2018 July 25, A. A. Dowd, “Fallout may be the Most Breathlessly Intense Mission: Impossible Adventure Yet”, in The A.V. Club‎, archived from the original on 31 July 2018:

     Ethan Hunt, the human missile of American intelligence that Tom Cruise has been popping back in to play for more than 20 years now, is masquerading as a mysterious terrorist, the perfectly named John Lark, to buy back some plutonium he’s lost to a cabal of doomsday extremists.