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A jester; a buffoon. [Obs.] Chaucer.

Jesting; buffoonery. [Obs.] Chaucer.

A buffoon; a merry-andrew; a court fool. This . . . was Yorick's skull, the king's jester. Shak. Dressed in the motley garb that jesters wear. Longfellow.

in a morris dance; a May queen. Afterward, a grotesque character personated in sports and buffoonery by a man in woman's clothes.

One whose business is to make sport for others; a buffoon; a zany; especially, one who attends a mountebank or quack doctor.

One who imitates or mimics, especially one who does so for sport; a copyist; a buffoon. Burke.

One who mumms, or makes diversion in disguise; a masker; a buffon. Jugglers and dancers, antics, mummers. Milton.

Masking; frolic in disguise; buffoonery. The mummery of foreign strollers. Fenton.

e house where operas are exhibited. Opéra bouffe Etym: [F. opéra opera + bouffe comic, It.buffo], Opera buffa Etym: [It.], light, farcical, burlesque opera. -- Opera box, a partially inclosed portion of the auditorium of an opera house for the use of a small private party. -- Opéra comique Etym: [F.], comic or humoro…

To exceed in buffoonery. [Obs.] B. Jonson.

An assumption of buffoonery to cover some serious purpose. [R.] Donaldson.

Aridiculous character, or an old dotard, in the Italian comedy; also, a buffoon in pantomimes. Addison. The sixth age shifts Into the lean and slippered pantaloon. Shak.

The character or performances of a pantaloon; buffoonery. [R.] Lamb.

A merry-andrew; a buffoon. [Obs.] Addison.

A wit; a humorist; a buffoon. [Obs.]

The buffoon or harlequin of a puppet show. Punch and Judy, a puppet show in which a comical little hunchbacked Punch, with a large nose, engages in altercation with his wife Judy.

A punch; a buffoon; originally, in a puppet show, a character represented as fat, short, and humpbacked. Spectator.

terized by great boastfulness and poltroonery; hence, a person of like characteristics; a buffoon.

Such as befits a buffoon or vulgar jester; grossly opprobrious or loudly jocose in language; scurrilous; as, scurrile taunts. The wretched affectation of scurrile laughter. Cowley. A scurrile or obscene jest will better advance you at the court of Charles than father's ancient name. Sir W. Scott.

That which is scurrile or scurrilous; gross or obscene language; low buffoonery; vulgar abuse. Interrupting prayers and sermons with clamor and scurrility. Macaulay.