Veiled

Part of speech: adjective

Definitions

1. Concealed from direct observation or comprehension, often indicating something that is not immediately visible or clear, such as emotions or motives
2. Hidden or obscured, usually signifying a deliberate lack of clarity about certain facts or feelings that are not fully disclosed
3. Obscured from view or understanding, typically relating to something that is intentionally kept secret or not fully revealed, such as intentions or feelings

Etymology: The adjective "veiled" is the past participle of "veil," and the verb's history runs through a sail. Latin "vēlum" meant a cloth or covering, and it also named the sail of a ship, since a sail is a large sheet of cloth catching the wind. That sense passed into Old French as "voil," meaning both sail and veil, and in Anglo-Norman and Old Northern French the word settled into "veil," meaning sail, veil or shroud. The same Latin root gave English "velum," a thin membrane, and "voile," a light, sheer fabric, so these words are doublets of one another. English already had its own word for a veil, "scleire" or "sleyre," but the French term displaced it in Middle English. The meaning of concealment came from the cloth itself: a veil hangs between the viewer and what lies behind it. From there, "veiled" came to describe anything hidden or muffled, and then to describe feelings or facts that are only partly revealed, as in a "veiled threat."

Synonyms: hidden, concealed, masked, shrouded, obscured

Antonyms: revealed, exposed, uncovered, clear, open