Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
Definitions: Camouflage |
CamouflageNoun1. An outward semblance that misrepresents the true nature of something; "the theatrical notion of disguise is always associated with catastrophe in his stories". 2. Fabric dyed with splotches of green and brown and black and tan; intended to make the wearer of a garment made of this fabric hard to distinguish from the background. 3. Device or stratagem for concealment or deceit. 4. The act of concealing the identity of something by modifying its appearance; "he is a master of disguise". Verb1. Disguise by camouflaging; exploit the natural surroundings to disguise something; "The troops camoflaged themselves before they went into enemy territory". Source: WordNet 1.7.1 Copyright © 2001 by Princeton University. All rights reserved. |
Date "camouflage" was first used in popular English literature: sometime before 1900. (references) |
| Domain | Definitions |
Mining | The substitution for a common element in a crystal lattice by a traceelement of the same valence. CF:admittance; capture. (references) |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)
Camouflage is that which allows an otherwise visible object to remain unseen. Thus a tiger's stripes and the fatigues of a modern soldier are both examples of camouflage. Camouflage is a form of deception.
Successful camouflage is often an essential part of modern military tactics. The first recorded large-scale use of camouflage was during World War I. At the beginning of the war the French experienced heavy losses because the troops wore red trousers as part of their uniform. The French established a section de camouflage in 1915. The camouflage experts were, for the most part, painters like Jean-Louis Forain, Jacques Villon, Andre Dunoyer de Segonzac, Charles Camoin, and Ludwig-Casimir Marcoussis, sculptors like Henri Bouchard and Charles Despiau, and theatre set artists. This led to a new horizon blue uniform and various camouflage paint schemes for trucks, guns and planes. Units of Camoufleurs who were artists, designers, or architects in civilian life were also largely used by the British or Americans and to a lesser extent by the Germans (see, for example, Lozenge), Italians and Russians.
Abbott H. Thayer, Franz Marc, Oskar Schlemmer, Edward Wadsworth, William Stanley Hayter, Arshile Gorky, Thomas Hart Benton, Grant Wood, Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, and Ellsworth Kelly all served as camouflage experts.
World War I also saw the advent of ship camouflage. Although most gunships were still painted a uniform grey, five schemes were approved in the United States for merchant ship camouflage. Ships without camouflage were required to pay higher war risk premiums.
William MacKay, the creator of a popular scheme of camouflage approved by the Naval Consulting Board during World War I, wrote:
People with maskun or other color blindness have been used to detect camouflage, because they have heightened sensitivity to visual patterns and their visual sensitivity curve is different from that of people with normal sight.
External Sources:
The opposite of camouflage is making a person or object more visible and easier to recognize, for example with retroreflectors and high-visibility clothing.
Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Camouflage."
Synonyms: CamouflageSynonyms: camo (n), disguise (n). (additional references) |
| Context | Synonyms within Context (source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus). |
Ambush | Noun: camouflage; mimicry; hiding place; secret place, secret drawer; recess, hold, holes and corners; closet, crypt, adytum, abditory, oubliette. |
Camouflage. | |
Defense | Safeguard; (safety); balistraria; bunker, screen; (shelter); camouflage; (concealment); fortification; munition, muniment; trench, foxhole; bulwark, fosse, moat, ditch, entrenchment, intrenchment; kila; dike, dyke; parapet, sunk fence, embankment, mound, mole, bank, sandbag, revetment; earth work, field-work; fence, wall dead wall, contravallation; paling; (inclosure); palisade, haha, stockade, stoccado, laager, sangar; barrier, barricade; boom; portcullis, chevaux de frise; abatis, abattis, abbatis; vallum, circumvallation, battlement, rampart, scarp; escarp, counter-scarp; glacis, casemate; vallation, vanfos. |
| Source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus. | |
Crosswords: Camouflage |
| English words defined with "camouflage": apatetic coloration. (references) |
| Specialty definitions using "camouflage": CAMOUFLAGE ASSEMBLER, CAMOUFLAGE SPECIALIST ♦ disruptive pattern ♦ false color film, FIELD ARTILLERY CREWMEMBER ♦ INFANTRY INDIRECT FIRE CREWMEMBER ♦ laying-up position ♦ SURVIVAL SPECIALIST. (references) |
| Non-English Usage: "Camouflage" is also a word in the following languages with English translations in parentheses. French (camouflage), Swedish (camouflage). |
| Domain | Usage | |
Screenplays | Cretan camouflage sir. If you want to blend in with a bunch of drunken Greeks there's nothing better. (Good Morning, Vietnam; writing credit: Mitch Markowitz) I've got some camouflage jackets in the Jeep, sirs, I suggest you both put them on. (A Few Good Men; writing credit: Aaron Sorkin) The problem is that the Hummer and the National Guardsmen are wearing jungle camouflage. For those of you who have never been to San Francisco, the bridge is bright orange. (Robin Williams: Live on Broadway; writing credit: Robin Williams) Oh, mighty scorpion, dangerous beast of the ocean with your powerful daggers, and your camouflage you have little to fear from other fish. (Zaat; writing credit: Ron Kivett; Lee O. Larew) | |
Movie/TV Titles | Camouflage (1961) A Lecture on Camouflage (1944) Camouflage (1943) A Camouflage Kiss (1918) Camouflage (2001) | |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | ||
| Domain | Title | ||
Books |
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Theater & Movies | |||
Music |
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High Tech |
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Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |||
| Speaker | Term | Phrase(s) |
John F. Kennedy | 1961-1963 | On the contrary the Soviets are rapidly continuing their construction of missile support and launch facilities, and serious attempts are under way to camouflage their efforts. |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
| "Camouflage" is generally used as a noun (singular) -- approximately 82.11% of the time. "Camouflage" is used about 218 times out of a sample of 100 million words spoken or written in English. Its rank is based on over 700,000 words used in the English language. Some parts-of-speech are not covered due to the samples used by the British National Corpus. (note: percents less than one-hundredth of one percent have been omitted) |
| Parts of Speech | Percent | Usage per 100 Million Words | Rank in English |
| Noun (singular) | 82.11% | 179 | 23,133 |
| Lexical Verb (infinitive) | 14.68% | 32 | 61,292 |
| Lexical Verb (base form) | 3.21% | 7 | 133,076 |
| Total | 100.00% | 218 | N/A |
Source: compiled by the editor from several corpora; see credits.
Expressions using "camouflage": camouflage battle dress ♦ camouflage color ♦ camouflage detection ♦ camouflage detection photography ♦ camouflage dress ♦ camouflage oneself ♦ camouflage paint ♦ helmet with camouflage cover ♦ radar camouflage. Additional references. | |
| Hyphenated Usage | |
Beginning with "camouflage": camouflage-net. | |
Ending with "camouflage": anti-camouflage, desert-camouflage. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| The following statistics estimate the number of searches per day across the major English-language search engines as identified by various trade publications. Hyperlinks lead to commercial use of the expression at Amazon.com. |
| Expression | Frequency per Day |
camouflage | 3,139 |
camouflage clothing | 335 |
camouflage pattern | 90 |
camouflage bedding | 89 |
camouflage rapper | 84 |
camouflage background | 74 |
camouflage fabric | 68 |
camouflage pants | 61 |
camouflage paint | 55 |
camouflage wallpaper | 50 |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| Language | Translations for "camouflage"; alternative meanings/domain in parentheses. | |
Albanian | maskoj (disguise, mask, screen, veil), maskim (cover, cover up, disguise). (various references) | |
Arabic | موه (gild, whitewash), تمويه (concealment, disguise, gilding, silvering, whitewash), عمى (blind, blindness, darkness, mystify, riddle), خدع (bamboozle, beguile, betray, bilk, bitch, bite, blind, bluff, brown, bubble, catch, cheat, chisel, con, crook, deceive, deception, decoy, defraud, delude, diddle, do, dupe, entrap, fall for, feint, fiddle, fob, fool, fox, get round, give the lie to, gull, gyp, hoax, hocus pocus, humbug, illusory, impose, intrigue, jape, job, leg pull, lure, mislead, mock, mystify, nick, overreach, pitch, play a trick, pose, prank, pull a fast one, pull his leg, ream, rook, sell, settle his hash, skin, skunk, slang, stick, string along, swank, swindle, take for a ride, take in, trick, victimize, wile), المظهر الزائف. (various references) | |
Bulgarian | камуфлаж, маскировка (varnish), маскирам (dress up, mask). (various references) | |
Chinese | 伪装 (camouflaged). (various references) | |
Czech | maskovat (hide, mask), maskování (cover up, masking), kamuflovat, kamufláž. (various references) | |
Farsi | پنهان کردن وساءل جنگی , پوشاندن (Apparel, Blanket, Case, Clothe, Coat, Cover, Emboss, Envelop, Immerse, Jacket, Line, Mask, Overcast, Sheath, Sheathe, Shroud, Submerge, Suffuse, Veil), پوشش (Armature, Capsule, Casing, Coating, Cover, Envelope, Gear, Mantle, Overlay, Robe, Roof, Shale, Shield, Shroud, Tunic), مخفی کردن (Huddle, Occult, Stow, Submerge), استتار. (various references) | |
Finnish | naamiointi (colour masking, mask, masking, masking process), naamioida (disguise, make-up, mask). (various references) | |
French | camouflage. (various references) | |
German | tarnung (blind, disguise, simulation). (various references) | |
Greek | καμουφλάζ, συγκάλυψη (concealment, cover up, masking). (various references) | |
Hebrew | ל"סוות (conceal, disguise, hide, mask, shush), "סוא" (stalking horse). (various references) | |
Hungarian | álcázás (cover up, cover-up, dazzle, mask, masking, palliation, protective concealment, screen, screening, shielding). (various references) | |
Indonesian | samaran (guise), pengabuan. (various references) | |
Italian | camuffare (disguise, disguise oneself, dress as), camuffamento (camouflaging), travestimento (disguise, incrustation), mimetizzazione, mimetizzare (camouflage oneself), maschera (anaesthetic face mask, anaesthetic mask, anesthetic face mask, anesthetic mask, boilerplate, cover, disguise, face mask, guise, mask, mask image, masker, masking image, master items, repetitive elements, screen, stock character, surgical mask, thick-film screen, usher), frode (cheating, deceit, evasion, fraud, humbug, swindle, tax evasion). (various references) | |
Japanese Kanji | 迷彩 (disguise), "装 (disguise), 偽装 (disguise), カポシ肉腫 (cam, camellia, camembert, cameo, camera, camera angle, camera position, camera rehearsal, camera reportage, camera work, camera-eye, cameraman, camomile, CAMUS, chameleon, collar, collarless, color, color arrangement, color box, color combination, color conditioning, color coordinator, color display, color dynamics, color ink, color marking pen, color mechanical tint, color planning, color rinse, color screentone, color spraypaint, colored, colored steel sheet, colorless, colour, comeback, cummerbund, French cognac, kapok, Kaposi sarcoma, kayak, younger members of the group). (various references) | |
Japanese Katakana | ぎそう (ceremonial equipment, disguise, fitting-out of a ship, rigging, ship's outfit), めいさい (details, disguise, obvious), カモフラージュ , カモフラージ , カ フラージュ . (various references) | |
Korean | 위장 (gastrointestinal). (various references) | |
Manx | keiltynys (furtiveness, harbourage, hiding, in concealment, latency, reconditeness, screening, secrecy, secretness), cur keiltynys er. (various references) | |
Pig Latin | amouflagecay.(various references) | |
Portuguese | camuflar (fudge, mask), camuflagem (masking, taping), simular (affect, assume, counterfeit, feign, feigned, feldspar, make believe, palter, play actor, pretend, purport, put on, sham, simulate), dissimulação (concealment, disguise, disguising, dissimulation, fancy dress ball, hiding, masking, Masquerade, obliquity, palliative, slyness, veiling), disfarce (cloak, cloaking, coloring, colouring, concealment, cover, disguise, disguising, dissimulator, fancy dress, impersonation, mask, Masquerade, mimicking, veil, veiling, window dressing), disfarçar (cloak, color, colour, defeature, disguise, dissemble, fudge, gilded, mantle, mask, varnish). (various references) | |
Romanian | camuflaj (black out, dazzle, veil). (various references) | |
Russian | камуфляж, маскировка (blackout, concealment, disguise, impersonation, screening), маскировать (disguise, dissemble, mask, veil). (various references) | |
Serbo-Croatian | maskirati (mask), maskiranje, kamuflirati, kamuflaža. (various references) | |
Spanish | camuflaje. (various references) | |
Swedish | maskering (disguise, masking). (various references) | |
Turkish | kamufle etmek (dazzle, mask, screen), kamuflaj (mask), gizlemek (blot out, bottle up, Bury, cache, cloak, conceal, cover up, disguise, dissemble, draw a veil over, enshroud, gloss over, gloze, gloze over, hide, hoodwink, hugger mugger, huggermugger, hush, hush up, keep back, keep from, keep in dark, keep in one's bosom, keep smth. under wraps, keep snug, mask, obscure, plant, pocket, screen, secrete, sheathe, shroud, sweep under the carpet, tuck away, veil), gizleme (concealment, dissimulation, hiding, secretion, suppression). (various references) | |
Ukranian | хитрощі (arts, circumvention, deceit, fetch, wiles), камуфляж (dazzle), вдаватися до хитрощів, окозамислювання, маскування (cover up, disguise, screening), маскувальні засоби, маскуатися, займатися окозамилюванням. (various references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various translation references. | ||
| Language | Period | Translations |
| Italian | 900-Modern | camuffare. (various references) |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
Derivations | |
Words beginning with "camouflage": camouflageable, camouflaged, camouflages. (additional references) | |
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"Camouflage" is suggested in spellcheckers for the following: Calorflame, camaouflage, camauflage, camoflage, camoouflage, camoufage, camouflag, camouflagr, camouflague, camouflauge, camourflage, camuflage, comouflage, pantouflage. (additional references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor, based on several corpora (additional references). | |
Scrabble® Enable2K-Verified Anagrams | |
| Words within the letters "a-a-c-e-f-g-l-m-o-u" | |
-1 letter: guacamole. | |
-2 letters: glaucoma. | |
-3 letters: cageful, coagula, faculae, leucoma, maculae, moulage. | |
-4 letters: aflame, agleam, almuce, caeoma, facula, faecal, faucal, fecula, macula, macule. | |
-5 letters: afoul, alamo, algae, algum, almug, amole, camel, cameo, celom, coala, comae, comal, fecal, flame, fleam, flume, focal, fugal, fugle, galea, glace, gleam, gloam, glume, golem, guaco, locum, macle, mogul, oleum, omega, ulama, ulema. | |
| Words containing the letters "a-a-c-e-f-g-l-m-o-u" | |
+1 letter: camouflaged, camouflages. | |
+4 letters: camouflageable. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. SCRABBLE® is a registered trademark. All intellectual property rights in and to the game are owned in the U.S.A and Canada by Hasbro Inc., and throughout the rest of the world by J.W. Spear & Sons Limited of Maidenhead, Berkshire, England, a subsidiary of Mattel Inc. Mattel and Spear are not affiliated with Hasbro. | |
Hexadecimal (or equivalents, 770AD-1900s) (references)43 61 6D 6F 75 66 6C 61 67 65 |
| Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519; backwards) (references)
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| American Sign Language (origins from 1620-1817 in Italy and, especially, France) (references)
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| Semaphore (1791, in France) (references)
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| Braille (1829, in France) (references)
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Morse Code (1836) (references)-.-. .- -- --- ..- ..-. .-.. .- --. . |
| Dancing Men (Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, 1903) (references)
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Binary Code (1918-1938, probably earlier) (references)01000011 01100001 01101101 01101111 01110101 01100110 01101100 01100001 01100111 01100101 |
HTML Code (1990) (references)C a m o u f l a g e |
ISO 10646 (1991-1993) (references)0043 0061 006D 006F 0075 0066 006C 0061 0067 0065 |
| British Sign Language (Fingerspelling, BSL; 1992, British Deaf Association Dictionary of British Sign Language) (references)
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Encryption (beginner's substitution cypher): (references)37677981877278677371 |
| 1. Definition 2. Synonyms 3. Crosswords 4. Usage: Modern | 5. Usage: Commercial 6. Images: Slideshow 7. Quotations: Speeches 8. Usage Frequency | 9. Expressions 10. Expressions: Internet 11. Translations: Modern 12. Translations: Ancient | 13. Derivations 14. Anagrams 15. Orthography 16. Bibliography |
Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
