TANGLED

tangled

(adjective) in a confused mass; “pushed back her tangled hair”; “the tangled ropes”

Byzantine, convoluted, involved, knotty, tangled, tortuous

(adjective) highly complex or intricate and occasionally devious; “the Byzantine tax structure”; “Byzantine methods for holding on to his chairmanship”; “convoluted legal language”; “convoluted reasoning”; “the plot was too involved”; “a knotty problem”; “got his way by labyrinthine maneuvering”; “Oh, what a tangled web we weave”- Sir Walter Scott; “tortuous legal procedures”; “tortuous negotiations lasting for months”

Source: WordNet® 3.1

Verb

tangled

simple past tense and past participle of tangle

Source: Wiktionary

TANGLE

Tan"gle, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Tangled; p. pr. & vb. n. Tangling.] Etym: [A frequentative fr. tang seaweed; hence, to twist like seaweed. See Tang seaweed, and cf. Tangle, n.]

1. To unite or knit together confusedly; to interweave or interlock, as threads, so as to make it difficult to unravel the knot; to entangle; to ravel.

2. To involve; to insnare; to entrap; as, to be tangled in lies. "Tangled in amorous nets." Milton. When my simple weakness strays, Tangled in forbidden ways. Crashaw.

Tan"gle, v. i.

Definition: To be entangled or united confusedly; to get in a tangle.

Tan"gle, n.

1. Etym: [Cf. Icel. þöngull. See Tang seaweed.] (Bot.)

Definition: Any large blackish seaweed, especially the Laminaria saccharina. See Kelp. Coral and sea fan and tangle, the blooms and the palms of the ocean. C. Kingsley.

2. Etym: [From Tangle, v.]

Definition: A knot of threads, or other thing, united confusedly, or so interwoven as not to be easily disengaged; a snarl; as, hair or yarn in tangles; a tangle of vines and briers. Used also figuratively.

3. pl.

Definition: An instrument consisting essentiallly 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. Blue tangle. (Bot.)See Dangleberry.

– Tangle picker (Zoöl.), the turnstone. [Prov. Eng.]

Source: Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary 1913 Edition