A marionette is a puppet whose arms and legs — and often the head — move when someone above pulls strings, or sometimes thin wires. The person working it stands over the little stage, not inside the puppet. A hand puppet lives on your hand; a marionette dances from above. That is the real split, though people say puppet for all of them in loose talk. You meet the word in theatre, children’s shows, and art more than in everyday chat, but the picture is famous. People also stretch it: if someone is “a marionette,” other people are pulling the strings and that person has little real choice. That use is more in writing than in the playground.