masker

present singular third person maskers · participle present maskering · participle past maskered · past maskered

1. dialectaltransitiveTo render giddy or senseless

   To masker their troubled heads the more, hee assaileth them with a great shout and maine violence.

   1659, T[itus] Livius [i.e., Livy], “(please specify the book number)”, in Philemon Holland, transl., The Romane Historie […], London: […] W. Hunt, for George Sawbridge, […], →OCLC

   1 more example

   He is so, for he is not one that sets forth to the wars with great resolutions and hopes, and returns with maskered fears, and despairs; neither is he like those that take more care, and are more industrious to get gay clothes, and fine feathers, [...]

   2000, Paul Salzman, Early Modern Women's Writing

   Synonyms: confuse, bewilder, stupefy

2. dialectalintransitiveTo be bewildered.
3. dialectaltransitiveTo choke; stifle.
4. dialectaltransitiveTo decay; rust.

plural maskers

1. One who wears a mask; one who appears in disguise at a masquerade or wears a mask in a ritual.

   But to the chamber which lies most westwardly of the seven, there are now none of the maskers who venture; for the night is waning away […].

   1842, Edgar Allan Poe, The Masque of the Red Death

   1 more example

   Like the men's society, the corporate consciousness of women and their respected place in the political body is represented by a masked spirit. This sowei (masker), like all the officials of the society, represents the corporate body of women and retains the authority to levy fines and punish women and men or the community as a whole. The ndoli Jowei (dancing sowei) is a masker whose figure is completely covered with black raffia, topped by the sowei mask.

   2012, L. Day, Gender and Power in Sierra Leone: Women Chiefs of the Last Two Centuries, →ISBN

2. That which masks (noise in a signal, etc.).

plural Maskers

1. A surname.