v. [f. EN-1 + TWIST v.] trans. a. To clasp with a twist. b. To form into a twist. c. To twist in with.
α. 1590. Shaks., Mids. N., IV. i. 48. So doth the woodbine, the sweet Honisuckle, Gently entwist.
1683. A. Snape, Anat. Horse, I. x. (1686), 20. They [the guts] are gathered up and entwisted in the folds of the Mesentery.
1705. Philips, Blenheim, 249 (Jod.). Th’ unweeting prey Entwisted roars.
1750. Johnson, Rambler, No. 68, ¶ 5. Very few … have their thread of life entwisted with the chain of causes on which armies or nations are suspended.
1769. Mrs. Montagu, Lett., II. 114. Though the single thread will not bear handling, yet twisted, and entwisted … it is hard to be broken.
1837. New Monthly Mag., XLIX. 399. Some had a maze of horsehair … entwisted round their polls.
β. 1649. Roberts, Clavis Bibl., iii. 63. Intwisted or woven together like a curious silken web.
1711. Wallis, in J. Greenwood, Eng. Gram., 282. When a Twister a-twisting, will twist him a twist; For the twisting of his twist, he three twines doth intwist.
1805. Southey, Madoc, II. xii. His untrimm’d hair, a long and loathsome mass, With cotton cords intwisted.
1864. Neale, Seaton. Poems, 111. The endless lines Intwisted and enlinked.
Hence Entwisted ppl. a.
a. 1800. Cowper & Hayley, trans. Andreini’s Adam, IV. i. The fatal sound of these entwisted pipes.
a. 1813. A. Wilson, Ep. C. Orr, Poet. Wks. (1846), 170. His noontide walks, his vine entwisted bowers.
1855. Singleton, Virgil, II. 38. A pliant collar of entwisted gold.
