travest

present singular third person travests · participle present travesting · participle past travested · past travested

1. formaltransitiveuncommonTo travesty; to disguise; to parody; to demean.First known use 17th c.

   I have next shown you the Greeks, and " the wisdom" of their philosophy, often travesting, sometimes tarnishing the Christian religion : […]

   1839, Alexander Kinmont, “Lecture the Eighth; On the Unity in Variety of the Human Race”, in Twelve Lectures on the Natural History of Man, and the Rise and Progress of Philosophy, Cincinnati: U. P. James, page 232

   4 more examples

   I have not much endeavour'd to make any diſcoveries of it, and it is a hard matter to give any account thereof, without ſome hazard of traveſting Hiſtory into Romance.

   1678, Jean-Baptiste Tavernier, “Of the Womens Appartment. The Principal Heads” (chapter XVII), in J. P., transl., The Six Voyages of John Baptiſta Tavernier, London, page 89

   I grant that wit requires comparison and a contrast, be it incongruity, or even absurdity; in mean, burlesque or dignified objects ; be it in travesting, exaggerating or diminishing reality ; but I see no proof that these mental operations result from the faculty in question alone, and therefore from an intellectual faculty.

   1832, Johann Spurzheim, “Organ of Mirthfulness” (chapter XX), in Phrenology, or, The Doctrine of the Mental Phenomena, volume I, Boston: Marsh, Capen & Lyon, page 254

   In the first place we shall often be discussing facts which have been so travested by propaganda that your knowledge of them is bound to be imperfect.

   1963, Lewis A. Coser, editor, Sociology Through Literature, Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall, page 217

   The truth is that the child is not ‘like a boy,’ and that if you put him into a coat and waistcoat forthwith, he only would look like a small angel travested.

   1995, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, edited by Julia Markus, Dared and Done: The Marriage of Elizabeth Barrett and Robert Browning, Alfred A. Knopf, page 20