antimasque

But Jonson gave dramatic value to the masque, especially in his invention of the antimasque, a comedy or farcical element of relief, entrusted to professional players or dancers.

For example, his audience would have been expecting, based on other masques of this time, that the antimasque would be dispelled by virtue (usually embodied by the King and Queen).

But when he writes self-deprecatingly in the A Description of the Antimasque, "I was not at my best when I wrote that", the reader has to chorus agreement.