tortuous
/ˈtɔɹt͡ʃuəs/
Word Rarity
Rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 2.65 in modern English
8
Scrabble Score
8
Letters
3
Syllables
5
Unique Chars
Meaning
adj
Twisted; having many turns; convoluted.
Example Sentences
- "The badger made his dark and tortuous hole on the side of every hill where the copsewood grew thick."
- "The Southern acquired them because the little Class "B4" 0-4-0 tanks were finding heavy modern rolling stock more and more of a handful, and at war's end the railway had nothing of suitable power but short wheelbase on its books to take their place on the more tortuous of the dock lines."
- "2007 October 6, “Slogging on the Home Front”, editorial in The New York Times, It still takes almost half a year for the average veteran’s claim for disability benefits to be decided in a tortuous process that can involve four separate hearings."
- "But the early Tubes still tended to follow the public streets in order to save money, hence some tortuous curves."
- "Infortunate ascendent tortuous."
Etymology
From Middle English tortuous, tortuose, from Anglo-Norman and Old French tortuos, from Latin tortuōsus, from tortus (“a twisting, winding”).
Origin
Word Breakdown
- Root: *terkʷ-, tortuous, -, tortuos, tortuōsus
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /ˈtɔɹt͡ʃuəs/
- British English: /ˈtɔːt͡ʃuːəs/
Usage
Inflected Forms
more tortuous (comparative)
most tortuous (superlative)