disguise

From Middle English disgisen, disguisen, borrowed from Old French desguiser (modern French déguiser), itself derived from des- (“dis-”) (from Latin dis-) + guise (“guise”) (from a Germanic source).

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /dɪsˈɡaɪz/, /dɪzˈɡaɪz/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /dɪsˈɡaɪz/, /dɪˈskaɪz/

• Audio (US):

  (file)

• Hyphenation: dis‧guise
• Rhymes: -aɪz

disguise (countable and uncountable, plural disguises)

1. Material (such as clothing, makeup, a wig) used to alter one’s visual appearance in order to hide one's identity or assume another.

   A cape and moustache completed his disguise.

2. (figuratively) The appearance of something on the outside which masks what’s beneath.
3. The act or state of disguising, notably as a ploy.

   Any disguise may expose soldiers to be deemed enemy spies.

4. (archaic) A change of behaviour resulting from intoxication, drunkenness.

• camouflage
• guise
• mask
• pretense

disguise (third-person singular simple present disguises, present participle disguising, simple past and past participle disguised)

1. (transitive) To change the appearance of (a person or thing) so as to hide, or to assume an identity.

   Spies often disguise themselves.

   • 1911, Thomas Babington Macaulay, “Bunyan, John”, in 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica‎^[1]:

     Bunyan was forced to disguise himself as a wagoner.

2. (transitive, obsolete) To transform or disfigure, to change the appearance of in general.
3. (transitive) To avoid giving away or revealing (something secret); to hide by a false appearance.

   He disguised his true intentions.

4. (transitive, obsolete) To dress in newfangled or showy clothing, to deck out in new fashions.
5. (intransitive, obsolete) To dissemble, to talk or act falsely while concealing one’s thoughts.
6. (transitive, archaic) To affect or change by liquor; to intoxicate.
   • 1714 November 16 (Gregorian calendar), [Joseph Addison], “FRIDAY, November 5, 1714”, in The Spectator, number 616; republished in Alexander Chalmers, editor, The Spectator; a New Edition, […], volume VI, New York, N.Y.: D[aniel] Appleton & Company, 1853, →OCLC:

     I have just left the right worshipful, and his myrmidons, about a sneaker or five gallons; the whole magistracy was pretty well disguised before I gave them the slip.

     The spelling has been modernized.

   • 1863, Sheridan Le Fanu, The House by the Churchyard:

     But my lord was angry, and being disguised with liquor too, he would not let him go till they played more; and play they did, and the luck still went the same way; […]

• camouflage
• cloak
• mask
• hide