Meaning

noun a covering to disguise or conceal the face

noun activity that tries to conceal something

noun a party of guests wearing costumes and masks

originBorrowed 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 masque and mesh. Replaced Old English grīma (“mask”), whence grime, and…

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 3.0