GRAPH-WIDE SEARCH
MEASURE THE GRAPH ↗NOT JUST A DICTIONARY LOOKUP
6 EVIDENCE COLLECTIONSSEARCH
THE GRAPH.
Find a modern word—or search sideways through reconstructed roots, historical forms, meanings, languages, scholars, sources, claims, disputes, and witnesses.
WIKTIONARY VIA KAIKKI / WIKTEXTRACT
Imported dictionary evidence
These are source reports, not reviewed *SET-U ancestry. A list of templates or numbered etymologies is not an ancestor chain. Scholarly disagreements remain in the original source text.
35,981 English word records · 45,491 etymology sections in this online subset
PARTIAL ENGLISH COVERAGE · FULL CORPUS REMAINS LOCAL4 source sections across 1 headword matching “Mask”. These are separate from the reviewed results below.
maskEnglish (en) · Etymology 1Source text
Borrowed from Middle French masque (“a covering to hide or protect the face”), from Italian maschera (“mask, disguise”), from (a byform of, see it for more) Medieval Latin masca, mascha, a borrowing of Proto-West Germanic *maskā, from which English mesh and mask (“mesh”) (below at Etymology 2) are inherited. Doublet of mascara, masque, and mesh. Replaced Old English grīma (“mask”), whence grime, and displaced non-native Middle English viser (“visor, mask”) borrowed from Old French viser, visier.
Original Wiktionary entry and references ↗maskEnglish (en) · Etymology 2Source text
From Middle English maske, from Old English max, masċ (“net”), from Proto-West Germanic *maskā (“mesh, netting, mask”). Doublet of mesh and mask above.
Original Wiktionary entry and references ↗maskEnglish (en) · Etymology 3Source text
From Middle English *mask, masch, from Old English māx, māsc (“mash”). Doublet of mash.
Original Wiktionary entry and references ↗maskEnglish (en) · Etymology 4Source text
From Middle English masken, short for *maskeren, malskren (“to bewilder; be confused, wander”). More at masker.
Original Wiktionary entry and references ↗INDEPENDENT SOURCE LIBRARY
More sources for this spelling
These are spelling matches, not a claim of identical senses or agreement. Historical accounts retain their own editions and limits; none is automatically promoted into reviewed ancestry.
Chambers (1908)
1908- MaskEnglish · e-38538-8256
Mask, Masque, mask, n. anything disguising or concealing the face: anything that disguises: a pretence: a masquerade: a former kind of dramatic spectacle, in which actors personified mythological deities, shepherdesses,
Read the full source record → - MaskEnglish · e-38538-8257
Mask, mask, v.t. (Scot.) to steep, infuse.—v.i. to be infusing. [A form of mash.]
Read the full source record →
011
MODERN ENTRY POINTS
WORD DOSSIERS
023
ATTESTED / RECONSTRUCTED / BOUNDARY
HISTORICAL FORMS
●
Latin / Indo-European
persōna
actor’s mask; role; character; person
- DATE
- Latin
- MATCH
- gloss
- DOSSIERS
- 1
Etruscan / Tyrsenian
phersu
masked figure or ritual character
- DATE
- Etruscan, 6th century BCE
- MATCH
- gloss
- DOSSIERS
- 1
Ancient Greek / Indo-European
πρόσωπον
prósōponface; countenance; mask; character
- DATE
- Ancient Greek
- MATCH
- gloss
- DOSSIERS
- 1
032
WHERE INTERPRETATION IS TESTED
CLAIMS & DISPUTES
SCHOLARLY DISPUTES / 1
openprobableposition text
Does persōna securely mean a mask through which sound passes?
No secure reviewed etymology derives it as Latin per plus sonāre. The historical sources instead report a probable Etruscan connection and treat the origin as difficult.
CONTRARIAN TRUTHS / 1
RANK 117GRADE Acontrarian claim
A person was a mask and role before the modern individual.
Latin persōna carries mask, role, and character senses; a probable Etruscan phersu connection and proposed Greek route remain visibly uncertain.
041
BOOKS / DICTIONARIES / ARTICLES / DATABASES
SOURCES
050
FIRST USES & HISTORICAL OBJECTS
ATTESTATION WITNESSES
No reviewed record in this collection contains “mask.” Absence describes this graph, not all of linguistic scholarship.
06
SEARCH IS DISCOVERY, NOT PROOF
EVERY RESULT OPENS A PERMANENT EVIDENCE RECORD.
Matching text only locates a record. It does not raise confidence, settle a dispute, establish cognacy, or turn a source report into direct inspection. Follow the result into its citations and editorial limits.