twist

A twisting force.

Anything twisted, or the act of twisting.

Peter was always proud afterwards when he remembered that, with the Bargee's furious fingers tightening on his ear, the Bargee's crimson countenance close to his own, the Bargee's hot breath on his neck, he had the courage to speak the truth. "I wasn't catching fish," said Peter. "That's not your fault, I'll be bound," said the man, giving Peter's ear a twist—not a hard one—but still a twist.

Not the least turn or twist in the fibres of any one animal which does not render them more proper for that particular animal's way of life than any other cast or texture.

The form given in twisting.

Habakkuk brought him a ſmooth, ſtrong, tough Rope, made of many a ply of vvholeſome Scandinavian Hemp, compactly tvviſted together, vvith a Nooſe that ſlip'd as glib as a Bird-catcher's Gin. Jack ſhrunk and grevv pale at firſt ſight of it, he handled it, meaſur'd it, ſtretch'd it, fix'd it againſt the Iron-bar of the VVindovv to try its ſtrength, but not Familiarity could reconcile him to it. He found fault vvith the length, the thickneſs, and the tvviſt, nay, the very colour did not pleaſe him.

The degree of stress or strain when twisted.

A type of thread made from two filaments twisted together.

the thrid By griesly Lachesis was spun with paine, That cruell Atropos eftsoones vndid, With cursed knife cutting the twist in twaine […]

I was one morning walking arm in arm with him in St James's Park, his dress then being […] waistcoat and breeches of the same blue satin, trimmed with silver twist à la hussarde, and ermine edges.

To turn the ends of something, usually thread, rope etc., in opposite directions, often using force.

To join together by twining one part around another.

"Well, one day I went up in a balloon and the ropes got twisted, so that I couldn't come down again. It went way up above the clouds, so far that a current of air struck it and carried it many, many miles away. For a day and a night I traveled through the air, and on the morning of the second day I awoke and found the balloon floating over a strange and beautiful country."

To contort; to writhe; to complicate; to crook spirally; to convolve.

June 8, 1714, Alexander Pope, letter to Jonathan Swift twisting it into a serpentine form.

To wreathe; to wind; to encircle; to unite by intertexture of parts.

longing to twist bays with that ivy

There are pillars of smoke twisted about wreaths of flame.

To wind into; to insinuate.

Avarice twists itself into all human concerns.

A surname.