In the Greek bacchanalia and the Dionysus cult, which involved the use of masks, the ordinary controls on behaviour were temporarily suspended, and people cavorted in merry revelry outside their ordinary rank or status.

In some Greek masks, the wide and open mouth of the mask contained a brass megaphone enabling the voice of the wearer to be projected into the large auditoria.

By the 18th century, it was already a tourist attraction, Goethe saying that he was ugly enough not to need a mask.

[]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mask/#cite_note-18) Masks have been created with plastic surgery for mutilated soldiers.

In Ancient Rome, the word persona meant 'a mask'; it also referred to an individual who had full Roman citizenship. A citizen could demonstrate his or her lineage through imagines – death masks of ancestors. These were wax casts kept in a lararium (the family shrine). Rites of passage, such as initiation of young members of the family or funerals,

Middle East

Golden masks excavated from the Kalmakareh Cave in Lorestan, Iran, first half of the first Millennium BC, National Museum of Iran

In Roman gladiatorial tournaments masks were sometimes used. From archaeological evidence it is clear that these were not only protective but also helped make the wearer appear more intimidating. In medieval Europe and in Japan soldiers and samurai wore similarly ferocious-looking protective armour, extending to face-masks.

Burn mask, a piece of medical equipment that protects the burn tissue from contact with other surfaces, and minimises the risk of infection.

It is conjectured that the first masks may have been used by primitive people to associate the wearer with some kind of unimpeachable authority, such as a deity, or to otherwise lend credence to the person's claim on a given social role.