释义 |
pag·eant I. \ˈpajənt\ noun (-s) Etymology: Middle English pagyn, pagend, padgeant, from Medieval Latin pagina scene of a play, stage, from Latin pagina page 1. a. (1) obsolete : a scene or act of a play (as a medieval mystery play) (2) archaic : part, role b. obsolete : stage, platform; specifically : a stage or platform used for the open-air performance of medieval mystery plays and often mounted on wheels so as to be capable of being moved from place to place 2. a. : a falsely impressive display that masks lack of substance and reality : a mere show : pretense < saw through the hollowness, the sham, the silliness of the empty pageant in which I had always played — Oscar Wilde > b. : an ostentatious often exhibitionistic display < sympathize profoundly with a poetry that doesn't make a pageant of its bleeding heart — J.L.Lowes > 3. a. : show, spectacle, exhibition < a beauty pageant > < the variegated pageant of London life — Douglas Bush > especially : an elaborate usually open-air exhibition or spectacle that is marked typically by colorful often gorgeous costuming and scenery and often by vocal and instrumental music, that consists of a series of tableaux (as representations of important events in the history of a community) or of a loosely unified drama with spoken or sung parts or of an often resplendent parade or procession usually with showy floats and with a loosely dramatic or commemorative theme, and that is usually presented in celebration of an event or series of events or in honor of some personage or group or of a locality by amateur actors or other amateur performers recruited from or near the locality in which it is presented b. : a steady continuous movement of things developing or passing by in or as if in a parade or procession < this exciting pageant of events — J.H.Baker > < watch the pageant of the world go by — Ralph Hammond-Innes > 4. : pageantry 1 < for pageant of language he has had no equal in English — W.R.Thayer > < lacked the Roman appetite for pageant — John Buchan > < full of stately dignity and somber pageant — Richard Harrison > II. adjective archaic : of, relating to, or typical of pageants or pageantry < the pageant pomp of such a servile throne — John Dryden > III. transitive verb (-ed/-ing/-s) archaic : to surround with pageantry |