a. (sb.) [f. CURVI- + L. līnea line, līneāris linear.] Consisting of, or contained by, a curved line or lines; having the form of a curved line. (Opposed to rectilinear, and in Gothic Archit. to perpendicular, as applied to window-tracery.)

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1710.  Berkeley, Princ. Hum. Knowl., Introd. § 10. Neither swift nor slow, curvilinear nor rectilinear.

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c. 1746.  Maclaurin, Newton’s Philos. Disc., III. iii. (1748), 255 (R.). All the curvilinear motions in the solar system.

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1843.  Ruskin, Mod. Paint., I. II. III. iii. § 6. The minor contours … are … beautifully curvilinear.

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1865.  Tylor, Early Hist. Man., viii. 194. Scrapers with curvilinear edges.

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  Hence Curvilinearity; Curvilinearly adv.

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1847.  Craig, Curvilinearity, the state of being curvilinear.

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1824.  Landor, Imag. Conv. (1846), I. 183/1. The arrow acts in three manners; rectilinearly, curvilinearly, and perpendicularly.

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1872.  Cohen, Dis. Throat, 51. Another fold … stretching curvilinearly backwards.

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  So † Curvilineary, † Curvilineous [cf. F. curviligne, † courbeligne] adjs. = CURVILINEAR.

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1706.  Phillips (ed. Kersey), Curvilineal or Curvilineary (in Geom.), crooked-lined.

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1721.  in Bailey.

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1692.  Ray, Dissol. World, 115. Curvilineous concretions of Salts.

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