Note 608 — VI THE MASK (continued)

In Spanish Tragedy, i. 5, Hieronimo brings in a 'pompous jest' in which three knights hang up their scutcheons and capture three kings. This is called a 'mask' (l. 23), but there is no dance, only a dumb-show interpreted by Hieronimo. Similarly the 'Maske of Cupid' in Spenser, F. Q. III. xii, is merely an allegorical procession, without a dance. Later, Dekker and Ford's play of The Sun's Darling (1656) is described on the title-page as 'a moral masque'.