cloak
Americannoun
verb (used with object)
-
to cover with or as if with a cloak.
She arrived at the opera cloaked in green velvet.
-
to hide; conceal.
The mission was cloaked in mystery.
noun
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a wraplike outer garment fastened at the throat and falling straight from the shoulders
-
something that covers or conceals
verb
-
to cover with or as if with a cloak
-
to hide or disguise
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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cloaksimple
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cloakssimple
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have cloakedperfect
-
has cloakedperfect
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are cloakingprogressive
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am cloakingprogressive
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is cloakingprogressive
-
have been cloakingperfect progressive
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has been cloakingperfect progressive
Past
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cloakedsimple
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had cloakedperfect
-
was cloakingprogressive
-
were cloakingprogressive
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had been cloakingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of cloak
1175–1225; Middle English cloke (< Old French ) < Medieval Latin cloca, variant of clocca bell-shaped cape, bell; see clock 1
Explanation
A cloak is anything that conceals or hides something, like an over-sized, dark raincoat you wear when you don't want your friends to see you're going to the movies without them. As a noun, a cloak is usually a loose piece of clothing that you wear over your other clothes, like a cape or a gown. It especially refers to an outer garment that you might wear while traveling in order to protect your outfit or to conceal your identity. As a verb, to cloak is to conceal or hide something. If you were a famous person who wanted to go out alone, you might cloak your identity with a cloak.
Vocabulary lists containing cloak
The Balcony Scene from "Romeo and Juliet"
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"Encounter"
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Unit 2: Pivotal Words and Phrases
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
They wanted to be able to cloak this in the air of legitimacy, when it has nothing to do with what a real lawsuit would look like.
From Slate • Jun. 9, 2026
“I think that irrational exuberance that we saw in the dot com era … is just window dressing to cloak what, to me, is normalizing an addictive behavior in our society,” he said.
From MarketWatch • May 19, 2026
Some scientists describe this as the disease hiding behind an "invisibility cloak".
From BBC • May 3, 2026
“A diary is an assassin’s cloak which we wear when we stab a comrade in the back with a pen,” wrote William Soutar, a Scottish poet and diarist, in 1934.
From The Wall Street Journal • Apr. 6, 2026
On the cloak, right at the man’s chest, was a silver circle within a silver oval.
From "Half Upon a Time" by James Riley
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
