# veil

Pronunciation: say "VAYL" /veɪl/

## Noun

1. Something hung or spread out to hide or protect the face or to hide an object from view, usually made of a thin, sheer fabric such as gauze or crepe.
   - Simple: A piece of thin cloth that covers the face or hides something from view.
   - _The widow wore a black veil to the funeral, her face barely visible through the lace._
   - _A gauze veil was draped over the statue until the mayor pulled it away._
3. Anything that partly blocks or blurs a clear view, such as smoke, mist, or haze.
   - Simple: Something like smoke or mist that makes it hard to see clearly.
   - _By evening a veil of smoke from the wildfires hung over the city._
   - _Through the veil of falling snow, the lighthouse beam flickered on and off._
4. Something that covers or disguises the truth, like a mask or a pretense.
   - Simple: Something that hides the truth, like a mask or a false way of acting.
   - _The charity's veil of respectability fell away once the auditors examined its books._
   - _Under a veil of politeness, the two rivals traded barbed remarks all evening._
6. The boundary thought to separate the world of the living from the world of spirits.
   - Simple: The line some people believe separates living people from the world of spirits.
   - _At the séance, the medium claimed to hear voices from beyond the veil._
   - _In her last days she spoke calmly of crossing the veil to be with her late husband again._
7. A covering for a person or thing, such as a caul over the head, a nun's headdress, or a cloth over an altar or sacred vessel.
   - Simple: A cloth or cover over a person or thing, often over the head.
   - _Sister Agnes received her white veil when she entered the convent as a novice._
   - _A silk veil covered the chalice and paten until the offertory._
8. A thin layer of tissue that is attached to a mushroom or covers it.
   - Simple: A thin skin that covers a mushroom or is attached to it.
   - _As the mushroom grows, its veil tears, leaving white patches scattered across the cap._
   - _Field guides note whether a species has a universal veil, which encloses the entire young fruiting body._
9. A membrane connecting the edge of a mushroom's cap, or pileus, with the stalk.
   - Simple: A thin skin that joins the edge of a mushroom's top to its stem.
   - _As the cap expands, the veil tears away from its margin and often survives as a ring around the stalk._
   - _An unbroken veil hid the gills, a sign that the button mushroom had only just come up._
10. The calyptra of a moss, the hood-like covering over its developing spore capsule.
   - Simple: A thin cap that covers the part of a moss where its tiny spores grow.
   - _Each capsule of the moss was still capped by a pale, pointed veil._
   - _Bryologists use the shape of the veil, smooth or hairy, to help identify some moss genera._
11. The velum, a circular membrane around the edge of the cap of a medusa, the free-swimming jellyfish form.
   - Simple: A thin ring of skin around the edge of a jellyfish's body.
   - _Contracting its bell, the hydromedusa forced water through the narrow opening of its veil._
   - _In the drawing, the veil appears as a thin shelf projecting inward from the margin of the bell._

## Verb

2. To hide or cover something, as if with a veil.
   - Simple: To hide something, as if behind a thin cloth.
   - _A haze of dust veiled the valley as the trucks rumbled past._
   - _He tried to veil his disappointment behind a polite smile._
5. To dress someone in a veil, or to decorate something with a veil.
   - Simple: To put a veil on someone or something.
   - _Decorators veil the arches with gauze and tiny lights before every gala._
   - _The nuns veiled the young novice at the end of the ceremony._

## Other meanings

- (noun) An obscuration of the clearness of the tones in pronunciation.

## Origin

From Middle English veil, from Anglo-Norman and Old Northern French veil ("sail, veil, shroud"), from Latin vēlum ("cloth, covering"). It displaced Middle English scleire ("veil"; compare German Schleier) and is a doublet of velum and voile.

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/veil (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).