cloak-and-sword

[ klohk-uhn-sawrd ]

adjective

1. (of a drama or work of fiction) dealing with characters who wear cloaks and swords; concerned with the customs and romance of the nobility in bygone times.

Word History and Origins

Origin of cloak-and-sword¹

First recorded in 1800–10

Example Sentences

Over the next 20 years, with the help of several different collaborators, he brought out some of the world’s longest and most-beloved novels, notably the cloak-and-sword swashbuckler “The Three Musketeers,” and that unforgettable classic of revenge, “The Count of Monte Cristo.”

From Washington Post

In 47 years he produced 38 sometimes absurd but usually irresistible novels for the cloak-and-sword trade.

From Time Magazine Archive

Brief scenes excepted, the play is most interesting where philosophically it is least so: in the first act where the situation is forged, where there is some of the clang of cloak-and-sword drama, where the words still fly upward.

From Time Magazine Archive

Atherton—Black Oxen—hoping against hope that the Steinach process of rejuvenation will not be applied to various literary prominencies—books about sex—a few books not about sex—Sabatini and the gorgeous return of cloak-and-sword.

From Time Magazine Archive

Hence they exhibit a greater gravity of tone; but in other respects there is no difference between them and the cloak-and-sword comedies with which they share the element of comic underplots.

From Project Gutenberg