a. [a. AF. tortuous (12–13th c. in Hatz.-Darm.) = 14th c. F. tortueux, ad. L. tortuōs-us, ‘full of crooks or turns or twists’ f. tortu-s a twisting, f. tort-, ppl. stem of torquēre to twist.]
1. Full of twists, turns, or bends; twisted, winding, crooked, sinuous.
1426. Lydg., De Guil. Pilgr., 18320. A camell … is so encomerous Off bak corvyd and tortuous.
c. 1450. Merlin, xxii. 393. The dragon … be-tokened the kynge Arthur and his power;… and the taile that was so tortuouse be-tokened the grete treson of the peple.
1551. Recorde, Pathw. Knowl., I. Defin., Paralleles tortuouse, whiche bowe contrarie waies with their two endes.
1667. Milton, P. L., IX. 516. Hee … of his tortuous Traine Curld many a wanton wreath in sight of Eve.
1768. Sterne, Sent. Journ., Riddle Explained. The most difficult and tortuous passages of the heart!
1811. A. T. Thomson, Lond. Disp., II. (1818), 317. The root is perennial, woody, and tortuous.
1839. Darwin, Voy. Nat., ix. (1879), 186. We found the river-course very tortuous.
† b. Astron. Applied to the six signs of the zodiac from Capricornus to Gemini, which (in northern latitudes) rise more obliquely than the other six. Obs. rare–1.
c. 1391. Chaucer, Astrol., ii. § 28. Thise same signes, fro the heued of capricorne vnto the ende of geminis, ben cleped tortuos signes or kroked signes, for they arisen embelif on owre Orisonte.
c. Geom. Applied to a curve of which no two successive portions are in the same plane; also called a non-plane curve, curve in space, or curve of double curvature (see CURVATURE 1 b).
1867. [see TORTUOSITY 1 b].
2. fig. Not direct or straightforward; indirect, irregular, devious, circuitous, crooked: esp. in a moral sense. (In quot. 1801 app. Dealing in quaint ‘turns’ of speech or expression.)
[1682: see TORTIOUS 4.]
1807. Ld. Calthorpe, Lett., in Wilberforce’s Priv. Papers (1897), 104. Sir W. Scott … was very tortuous and amusing.
1823. Scott, Quentin D., viii. The unscrupulous cunning with which he assisted in the execution of the schemes of his master’s tortuous policy.
1858. Sears, Athan., III. vii. 319. A narrow and tortuous criticism.
1865. Mill, Exam. Hamilton, 415. The tortuous phraseology by which our author evades recognising the ideas of truth and falsity.
1911. Times, 2 Nov., 3/4. A more tortuous way of trying to get possession of goods he had never heard of.
¶ 3. Malign (obs.); wrongful. (Misused for or confused with TORTIOUS.)
1594. Greene & Lodge, Looking Glasse (1598), E iv b. What tortuous planets … Hath made the concaue of the earth vnclose?
1839. Times, 13 May. Keeping tortuous possession of premises after their several gentlemen had departed.
1839. Morn. Herald, 3 June. The first action ever brought against a returning officer for the tortuous refusal of a vote for members of parliament.
Hence Tortuously adv., in a tortuous manner (lit. and fig.; in quot. 1839 misused for TORTIOUSLY); Tortuousness, the quality or condition of being tortuous, tortuosity.
1813. Examiner, 29 Aug., 15/1. The Artist has given to Anarchy characteristic force and truth in the sculpture of the athletic and boldly marked muscles, and the desperate spirit displayed in his countenance, action, and tortuously snaked hair.
1824. New Monthly Mag., X. 175. Musty precedents … which an ingenious tortuousness may call in.
1839. Morn. Herald, 3 June. Any person, whose vote has been … tortuously refused at an election.
1853. Kane, Grinnell Exp., xlv. (1856), 413. We wound our way tortuously among them.
1862. H. Spencer, First Princ., II. ix. § 80 (1875), 245. In proportion to the complexity of social forces is the tortuousness of social movements.
1884. Pall Mall G., 8 Aug., 5/1. Puget Sound … runs southward tortuously from Vancouver Island far into the rugged heart of the Washington territory.
