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HOME | Definition of veil (VEIL, Veil)


    Vail \Vail\ (v[=a]l), v. i.
    To yield or recede; to give place; to show respect by
    yielding, uncovering, or the like. [Written also vale, and
    veil.] [Obs.]
    [1913 Webster]

    Thy convenience must vail to thy neighbor's necessity.
    --South.
    [1913 Webster]

    The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48


    Vail \Vail\, v. t. [Aphetic form of avale. See Avale, Vale.]
    [Written also vale, and veil.]
    1. To let fall; to allow or cause to sink. [Obs.]
    [1913 Webster]

    Vail your regard
    Upon a wronged, I would fain have said, a maid!
    --Shak.
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    2. To lower, or take off, in token of inferiority, reverence,
    submission, or the like.
    [1913 Webster]

    France must vail her lofty-plumed crest! --Shak.
    [1913 Webster]

    Without vailing his bonnet or testifying any
    reverence for the alleged sanctity of the relic.
    --Sir. W.
    Scott.
    [1913 Webster]

    The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48


    Veil \Veil\ (v[=a]l), n. [OE. veile, OF. veile, F. voile, L.
    velum a sail, covering, curtain, veil, probably fr. vehere to
    bear, carry, and thus originally, that which bears the ship
    on. See Vehicle, and cf. Reveal.] [Written also vail.]
    [1913 Webster]
    1. Something hung up, or spread out, to intercept the view,
    and hide an object; a cover; a curtain; esp., a screen,
    usually of gauze, crape, or similar diaphnous material, to
    hide or protect the face.
    [1913 Webster]

    The veil of the temple was rent in twain. --Matt.
    xxvii. 51.
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    She, as a veil down to the slender waist,
    Her unadorn['e]d golden tresses wore. --Milton.
    [1913 Webster]

    2. A cover; a disguise; a mask; a pretense.
    [1913 Webster]

    [I will] pluck the borrowed veil of modesty from the
    so seeming Mistress Page. --Shak.
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    3. (Bot.)
    (a) The calyptra of mosses.
    (b) A membrane connecting the margin of the pileus of a
    mushroom with the stalk; -- called also velum.
    [1913 Webster]

    4. (Eccl.) A covering for a person or thing; as, a nun's
    veil; a paten veil; an altar veil.
    [1913 Webster]

    5. (Zool.) Same as Velum, 3.
    [1913 Webster]

    To take the veil (Eccl.), to receive or be covered with, a
    veil, as a nun, in token of retirement from the world; to
    become a nun.
    [1913 Webster]

    The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48


    Veil \Veil\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Veiled; p. pr. & vb. n.
    Veiling.] [Cf. OF. veler, F. voiler, L. velarc. See Veil,
    n.] [Written also vail.]
    [1913 Webster]
    1. To throw a veil over; to cover with a veil.
    [1913 Webster]

    Her face was veiled; yet to my fancied sight,
    Love, sweetness, goodness, in her person shined.
    --Milton.
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    2. Fig.: To invest; to cover; to hide; to conceal.
    [1913 Webster]

    To keep your great pretenses veiled. --Shak.
    [1913 Webster]

    The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48


    Caul \Caul\ (k[add]l), n. [OE. calle, kelle, prob. fr. F. cale;
    cf. Ir. calla a veil.]
    1. A covering of network for the head, worn by women; also, a
    net. --Spenser.
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    2. (Anat.) The fold of membrane loaded with fat, which covers
    more or less of the intestines in mammals; the great
    omentum. See Omentum.
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    The caul serves for the warming of the lower belly.
    --Ray.
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    3. A part of the amnion, one of the membranes enveloping the
    fetus, which sometimes is round the head of a child at its
    birth; -- called also a veil.
    [1913 Webster +PJC]

    It is deemed lucky to be with a caul or membrane
    over the face. This caul is esteemed an infallible
    preservative against drowning . . . According to
    Chrysostom, the midwives frequently sold it for
    magic uses. --Grose.
    [1913 Webster]

    I was born with a caul, which was advertised for
    sale, in the newspapers, at the low price of fifteen
    guineas. --Dickens.
    [1913 Webster]

    The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48


    veil
    n 1: a garment that covers the head and face [syn: head covering]
    2: the inner embryonic membrane of higher vertebrates
    (especially when covering the head at birth) [syn: caul,
    embryonic membrane]
    3: a vestment worn by a priest at High Mass in the Roman
    Catholic Church; a silk shawl [syn: humeral veil]
    v 1: to obscure, or conceal with or as if with a veil; "women in
    Afghanistan veil their faces" [ant: unveil]
    2: make undecipherable or imperceptible by obscuring or
    concealing; "a hidden message"; "a veiled threat" [syn: obscure,
    blot out, obliterate, hide]

    WordNet (r) 2.0


    160 Moby Thesaurus words for "veil":
    alibi, apology, apply to, awning, bamboo curtain,
    barrier of secrecy, beach umbrella, becloud, befog, blackout,
    blanket, blind, block, bosom, camouflage, canopy, censorship,
    classify, cloak, clothe, cloud, coat, color, coloring, conceal,
    cope, cover, cover story, cover up, cover-up, coverage, covering,
    covert, coverture, cowl, cowling, curtain, device, disguise,
    dissemble, distract attention from, drape, drapery,
    draw the curtains, eclipse, enclose, ensconce, enshroud, envelop,
    enwrap, excuse, facade, false front, feint, file and forget, film,
    front, gloss, gloss over, guise, handle, hanging, hide,
    hold out on, hood, housing, hush-up, in petto, invest,
    iron curtain, ironbound security, keep, keep back, keep between us,
    keep buttoned up, keep close, keep dark, keep from,
    keep in ignorance, keep mum, keep secret, keep snug,
    keep under cover, keep under wraps, lame excuse, lay on, lay over,
    light shield, locus standi, make no sign, mantilla, mantle, mask,
    muffle, never let on, not give away, not tell, oath of secrecy,
    obduce, obfuscate, obscure, occult, official secrecy,
    ostensible motive, overlay, overshadow, overspread, pall, parasol,
    play dumb, poor excuse, pretense, pretension, pretext,
    protestation, public motive, put on, put-off, refuge, repression,
    screen, scum, seal of secrecy, secrete, security, semblance, shade,
    shader, shadow, sham, shelter, shield, show, shroud, shutter,
    slur over, smoke screen, smothering, spread over, stalking-horse,
    stifling, stratagem, subterfuge, sunblind, sunshade, superimpose,
    superpose, suppression, trick, umbrella, varnish, veil of secrecy,
    veiler, veiling, vestment, whitewash, withhold, wrap, wraps,
    yashmak

    Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0




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