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Curl   /kərl/   Listen
noun
Curl  n.  
1.
A ringlet, especially of hair; anything of a spiral or winding form. "Under a coronet, his flowing hair In curls on either cheek played."
2.
An undulating or waving line or streak in any substance, as wood, glass, etc.; flexure; sinuosity. "If the glass of the prisms... be without those numberless waves or curls which usually arise from the sand holes."
3.
A disease in potatoes, in which the leaves, at their first appearance, seem curled and shrunken.
Blue curls. (Bot.) See under Blue.


verb
Curl  v. t.  (past & past part. curled; pres. part. curling)  
1.
To twist or form into ringlets; to crisp, as the hair. "But curl their locks with bodkins and with braid."
2.
To twist or make onto coils, as a serpent's body. "Of his tortuous train, Curled many a wanton wreath in sight of Eve."
3.
To deck with, or as with, curls; to ornament. "Thicker than the snaky locks That curledMegaera." "Curling with metaphors a plain intention."
4.
To raise in waves or undulations; to ripple. "Seas would be pools without the brushing air To curl the waves."
5.
(Hat Making) To shape (the brim) into a curve.


Curl  v. i.  
1.
To contract or bend into curls or ringlets, as hair; to grow in curls or spirals, as a vine; to be crinkled or contorted; to have a curly appearance; as, leaves lie curled on the ground. "Thou seest it (hair) will not curl by nature."
2.
To move in curves, spirals, or undulations; to contract in curving outlines; to bend in a curved form; to make a curl or curls. "Cirling billows." "Then round her slender waist he curled." "Curling smokes from village tops are seen." "Gayly curl the waves before each dashing prow." "He smiled a king of sickly smile, and curled up on the floor."
3.
To play at the game called curling. (Scot.)





Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48


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"Curl" Quotes from Famous Books



... correctness, and touched with the greatest spirit. In his calms the sky is sunny, and brilliant, and every object is reflected in the glassy smoothness of the water, with a luminous transparency peculiar to himself. In his fresh breezes and squalls, the swell and curl of the waves is delineated with a truth and fidelity which could only be derived from the most attentive and accurate study of nature; in his storms, tempests, and hurricanes, the tremendous conflict of the elements and the ...
— Anecdotes of Painters, Engravers, Sculptors and Architects and Curiosities of Art (Vol. 3 of 3) • S. Spooner
... said she, with a curl of the lip, and an impatient tossing of her head. "How stupid you are, Hannah! The book I want, contains prints, and this is only a music book! There! Take it back, and bring me the ...
— Trials and Confessions of a Housekeeper • T. S. Arthur
... to have something very remarkable in their appearance, we will just take a sketch of the miser's son, as he alternately leans on the table or stalks about the room during his earnest conversation with his cousin. He has decidedly sentimental hair; long, black, shining, and with a tendency to curl; he has what might be termed poetical eyes, bright, piercing, and very restless; the sharp, aquiline nose of his father, slightly modified; and a mouth and brow which curl and knit in a manner that may be poetic, but might be disagreeable, under less soothing ...
— Gladys, the Reaper • Anne Beale
... fortunately, not precocious, for the infant prodigies of seven, who become the amazing omniscients of twenty-three, are seldom heard of at thirty. He learned very early to read, and his sisters remember that when he was still in starched white petticoats, with a curl carefully poised on top of his head, he went about the house lugging a thick, heavy volume of Livingstone's "Travels" and asking some one to tell him about the "foraging ants" described by the explorer. ...
— Theodore Roosevelt; An Intimate Biography, • William Roscoe Thayer
... waved perilous farewells to Buckingham,—to the day when the news of the fatal battle of Gien came to her in her dressing-room, and "she remained undisturbed before the mirror, not neglecting the arrangement of a single curl." ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Number 9, July, 1858 • Various


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