veil

[veyl] /veɪl/
noun
1.
a piece of opaque or transparent material worn over the face for concealment, for protection from the elements, or to enhance the appearance.
2.
a piece of material worn so as to fall over the head and shoulders on each side of the face, forming a part of the headdress of a nun.
3.
the life of a nun, especially a cloistered life.
4.
something that covers, separates, screens, or conceals:
a veil of smoke; the veil of death.
5.
a mask, disguise, or pretense:
to find fault under a veil of humor.
6.
Botany, Anatomy, Zoology. a velum.
7.
Mycology. a membrane that covers the immature mushroom of many fungi and breaks apart as the mushroom expands, leaving distinctive remnants on the cap, stalk, or stalk base.
8.
Scot. and North England. a caul.
verb (used with object)
9.
to cover or conceal with or as with a veil:
She veiled her face in black. A heavy fog veiled the shoreline.
10.
to hide the real nature of; mask; disguise:
to veil one's intentions.
verb (used without object)
11.
to don or wear a veil:
In certain Islamic countries women must veil.
Idioms
12.
take the veil, to become a nun.
Origin
1175-1225; (noun) Middle English veile < Anglo-French < Latin vēla, neuter plural (taken in VL as feminine singular) of vēlum covering; (v.) Middle English veilen < Anglo-French veiler, derivative of veile
Related forms
veilless, adjective
veillike, adjective
Examples from the web for veil
  • We stand admiring it as it is now, a beautiful wreck beneath an ivy veil.
  • These sorts of studies are crucial to our field lifting the veil of imitation that dance education has relied on too long.
  • Drink from it and your veil of confusion will disappear.
  • They do not write behind a veil of careful academic prose that weighs and measures each sentence.
  • She soon after took the religious veil, and he received the clerical tonsure.
  • He who would rise in the world should veil his ambition with the forms of humanity.
  • Saying this, he tore off her veil to discover her face.
  • By this power she carries her readers behind the veil obscuring less gifted apprehension.
  • Only quite recently has the veil been lifted from this perplexing historical problem.
  • In many other cases, the veil of anonymity was a thin one.
British Dictionary definitions for veil

veil

/veɪl/
noun
1.
a piece of more or less transparent material, usually attached to a hat or headdress, used to conceal or protect a woman's face and head
2.
part of a nun's headdress falling round the face onto the shoulders
3.
something that covers, conceals, or separates; mask: a veil of reticence
4.
the veil, the life of a nun in a religious order and the obligations entailed by it
5.
take the veil, to become a nun
6.
(botany) Also called velum. a membranous structure, esp the thin layer of cells connecting the edge of a young mushroom cap with the stipe
7.
(anatomy) another word for caul
8.
See humeral veil
verb
9.
(transitive) to cover, conceal, or separate with or as if with a veil
10.
(intransitive) to wear or put on a veil
Derived Forms
veiler, noun
veilless, adjective
veil-like, adjective
Word Origin
C13: from Norman French veile, from Latin vēla sails, pl of vēlum a covering

Veil

/French vaɪl/
noun
1.
Simone (Annie) (simɔn). born 1927, French stateswoman; president of the European Parliament (1979–82): a survivor of Nazi concentration camps
Word Origin and History for veil
n.

early 13c., from Anglo-French and Old North French veil (Old French voile) "a head-covering," also "a sail," from Latin vela, plural of velum "sail, curtain, covering," from PIE root *weg- "to weave a web." Vela was mistaken in Vulgar Latin for a feminine singular noun. To take the veil "become a nun" is attested from early 14c.

v.

late 14c., from Old French veler, voiller, from Latin velare "to cover, veil," from velum (see veil (n.)). Figurative sense of "to conceal" (something immaterial) is recorded from 1530s. Related: Veiled; veiling.

veil in Medicine

veil (vāl)
n.

  1. See caul.

  2. See velum.

veil in Science
veil
  (vāl)   
A membranous covering or part, especially a membrane surrounding the young mushrooms of certain basidiomycete fungi. In some species the membrane (called a partial veil) extends only from the stalk to the cap. As the cap expands, the veil breaks, leaving a ring called an annulus on the stalk and often scalelike pieces on the cap. These veil remnants are important for identifying species of mushrooms.
Idioms and Phrases with veil

veil

see: draw a veil over