pageantry

[ paj-uhn-tree ]

noun

, plural pag·eant·ries.

1. spectacular display; pomp:

   the pageantry of a coronation.

   Synonyms: show, ceremony, spectacle

2. mere show; empty display.
3. pageants collectively; pageants and the performance of pageants.

pageantry

/ ˈpædʒəntrɪ /

noun

1. spectacular display or ceremony
2. archaic.
   pageants collectively

Word History and Origins

Origin of pageantry¹

First recorded in 1600–10; pageant + -ry

Example Sentences

It’s easy to overinflate the accomplishments of the present, particularly when the event in question carries the pageantry of the Olympics.

From FiveThirtyEight

It was a celebration low on introspection but thick with pageantry.

From Time

He writes that virtual summits remove the pageantry and rituals that set these kinds of events apart from the day-to-day of politics, and makes them feel urgent and important to the participants.

From Quartz

Producers Jesse Collins, Stacey Sher and Steven Soderbergh have maintained that the ceremony will be shot like a movie, perhaps an effort to mix things up and attract viewers who lost interest in the usual pageantry over the years.

From Washington Post

The McSweenys typically bought a table and invited friends who had never been to an inaugural ball to let them experience the pageantry and patriotism first hand.

From Washington Post

Even the hot Jewish women I mentioned above did something a bit more “intellectual” than pageantry: acting.

From The Daily Beast

Passersby passed by, displaying the full pageantry of West Village life.

From The Daily Beast

A papal visit, by definition, is freighted with emotion and pageantry.

From The Daily Beast

Cannons were fired, brass bands played, and American-inspired pomp and pageantry abounded.

From The Daily Beast

But what gets lost among all the bitter pageantry is the little matter of delegates.

From The Daily Beast

The poor like the Queen personally, and like to gaze at royal pageantry; but they are not fanatically loyal.

From Project Gutenberg

The ceremony was shorn of the grotesque pageantry of chivalric times, and was confined to the interior of the abbey.

From Project Gutenberg

Its grand opening was a riot of splendid colorings and beauty, never surpassed in all pageantry.

From Project Gutenberg

Man seeks to adorn death; the pageantry of the funeral, the attractiveness of the cemetery, all show this.

From Project Gutenberg

It is a religion of love, practical, undemonstrative, knowing nothing of pageantry and spectacle.

From Project Gutenberg

Related Words

• grandeur
• magnificence
• pageant
• pomp
• spectacle
• splendor