ˈpuppet-play, n.
Also 7 poppet-play.
1. A play or dramatic performance acted by means, or with the aid, of puppets; usually with dialogue spoken by a concealed person or persons.
| 1599 Nashe Lenten Stuffe Wks. (Grosart) V. 292 My inuectiue hath relation to such as count al Artes puppet-playes, and pretty rattles to please children, in comparison of their confused barbarous lawe. 1610 B. Jonson Alch. i. ii, And blow vp gamster, after gamster, As they doe crackers, in a puppet-play. 1633 R[ogers] Treat. Sacraments i. 131 They make a mere apish Pageant and Poppet play of this Sacrament. 1712 Arbuthnot John Bull ii. v, What he lost to sharpers, and spent upon country dances and puppet-plays. 1850 Marsden Early Purit. xii. 339 Every stage, every table, every puppet-play scoffed at the puritans. |
2. The playing or acting of puppets.
| 1591 Nashe Pref. Sidney's Astr. & Stella in G. G. Smith Eliz. Crit. Ess. (1904) II. 223 Let not your surfeted sight, new come from such puppet play, think scorne to turn aside into this Theater of pleasure. 1849 Whittier Calef in Boston 21 Of your spectral puppet play I have traced the cunning wires. |
Hence ˈpuppet-play v. trans. (nonce-wd.), to bring or drive by means of puppet-play or jugglery.
| 1649 Trag. Massenello 75 Do you not see yourselves puppet-plaid into a new war? |