Empty, self-assertive boasting; an instance of such behaviour.
1828, Walter Scott, The Surgeon’s Daughter in Chronicles of the Canongate, Boston: Samuel H. Parker, p. 78,
[he] was an enemy to every thing that approached to fanfaronade, and knew enough of the world to lay it down as a sort of general rule, that he who talks a great deal of fighting is seldom a brave soldier
Loud, showy display, celebration or proclamation (of something), sometimes involving the playing of trumpets or other musical instruments.
1877, Frances Hodgson Burnett, That Lass o’ Lowrie’s, London: F. Warne, p. 55,
he dined in public—a fanfaronade of trumpets proclaiming his down-sitting and his up-rising
verb
(intransitive) To engage in empty, self-assertive boasting.
1990, E. Grady Jolly, United States Circuit Judge, opinion regarding the matter of Clark Pipe & Supply Co., cited in Robert L. Jordan and William D. Warren, Bankruptcy, Westbury, NY: The Foundation Press, fourth edition, 1995, pp. 653-654,
Given the agreement he was working under, his testimony was hardly more than fanfaronading about the power that the agreement afforded him over the financial affairs of Clark.
(ambitransitive) To proclaim loudly; to promote enthusiastically.
1892, Robert Brown, The Story of Africa and Its Explorers, London: Cassell, Volume 1, Chapter 11, p. 208,
Nowadays a returning traveller with half his merits is […] fanfaronaded every step of his homeward journey. The telegraph tells how he has arrived here, the special correspondent what he has to say there, until by the time he lands at Liverpool or Plymouth […] the interviewer and the illustrated journals have taken the heart out of any tale he may have to tell.
(intransitive) To make a noisy, showy display or celebration; to play a fanfare.