tangle

A tangled twisted mass.

Noun

  1. A tangled twisted mass.
  2. A complicated or confused state or condition.
    • I tried to sort through this tangle and got nowhere.
    • Economics is a messy discipline: too fluid to be a science, too rigorous to be an art. Perhaps it is fitting that economists’ most-used metric, gross domestic product (GDP), is a tangle too. GDP measures the total value...
  3. An argument, conflict, dispute, or fight.
  4. A region of the projection of a knot such that the knot crosses its perimeter exactly four times.
  5. A paired helical fragment of tau protein found in a nerve cell and associated with Alzheimer's disease.
  6. A form of art which consists of sections filled with repetitive patterns.

Origin

From Middle English tanglen, probably of North Germanic origin, compare Swedish taggla (“to disorder”), Old Norse þǫngull, þang (“tangle; seaweed”), see Etymology 2 below.

Forms

tangles

Synonyms

knot mess snarl maze argument conflict dispute fight

Derived

tanglefish tangle net tanglesome tangle-wrack tau tangle

Noun Entry 2

  1. Any large type of seaweed, especially a species of Laminaria.
    • […] if with thee the roaring wells ⁠Should gulf him fathom-deep in brine; ⁠And hands so often clasp’d in mine, Should toss with tangle and with shells. - 1850, [Alfred, Lord Tennyson], “Canto X”, in In Memoriam, London:...
    • You've never smelled the tangle o' the Isles. - 1917, “The Road to the Isles”, in Kenneth Macleod, editor, Songs of the Hebrides:
  2. An instrument consisting essentially of an iron bar to which are attached swabs, or bundles of frayed rope, or other similar substances, used to capture starfishes, sea urchins, and other similar creatures living at the bottom of the sea.
  3. Any long hanging thing, even a lanky person.

Origin

Of North Germanic origin, such as Danish tang or Swedish tång, from Old Norse þongull, þang. See also Norwegian tongul, Faroese tongul, Icelandic þöngull.

Forms

tangles

Hyponyms

kombu

Verb

  1. To mix together or intertwine.

    Synonyms: entangle knot mat snarl

  2. To become mixed together or intertwined.
    • Her hair was tangled from a day in the wind.
    • By the afternoon it seemed as if the storm had passed and that frost was setting in; but in the evening the wind rose to gale force, bringing telegraph poles down like skittles and tangling power and telephone lines. -...

    Synonyms: dishevel tousle

    Antonyms: untangle unsnarl

  3. To enter into an argument, conflict, dispute, or fight.
    • Don't tangle with someone three times your size.
    • He tangled with the law.
    • Compared to the last time they'd tangled with the U.S. Navy's carriers, the antiaircraft fire had been much, much more effective, even if the Wildcats hadn't done particularly well in their intercepts. They couldn't...

    Synonyms: argue conflict dispute fight

  4. To catch and hold.
    • tangled in amorous nets - 1671, John Milton, “The First Book”, in Paradise Regain’d. A Poem. In IV Books. To which is Added, Samson Agonistes, London: […] J[ohn] M[acock] for John Starkey […], →OCLC, page 2:
    • When my simple weakness strays, / Tangled in forbidden ways. - 1646, Richard Crashaw, Steps to the Temple:
    • This is a book about the potential for the reclamation, reform, and enlightened transformation of the most expansive elements of the liberal tradition— that social and economic justice remain tangled in liberalism's web...

    Synonyms: ensnare entrap

Forms

tangles tangling tangled

Synonyms

enmesh ensnare ensnarl entangle foul implicate imply involve mat ravel snarl tangle

Antonyms

untangle

Hypernyms

intertwine

Derived

antitangle atangle betangle detangle entangle intertangle it takes two to tangle nontangling pretangle retangle tanglefoot tanglegram tanglelegs tangleproof tangler tangletalk tanglingly tangly