Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Twisted; curved; bent.
  • Specifically, in botany, coiled like a rope: as, a tortile awn.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • adjective Twisted; wreathed; coiled.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective rare Twisted, winding, contorted.

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Latin tortilis, from the participle stem of torqueō ("twist, turn").

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Examples

  • Her uncorseted figure, with only a thin silken gown upon it, wreathed harmoniously in tortile oscillations, her long, black hair flying about her flushed face, and her soul afire with her thoughts and simulations.

    Mystic Isles of the South Seas. Frederick O'Brien 1900

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