tors-, tort-, -tort, tortu-, torqu-
(Latin: bend, curve, turn, twist)
2. Etymology: from Middle English, "injury"; from Old French, from Medieval Latin tortum; from Latin, torquere, "to twist, to turn".
To celebrate his reputation as a top tort lawyer, his cousin baked a torte and filled it with fresh fruit.
2. Anyone who moves slowly; a laggard: "There is an old fable, The Tortoise and the Hare, which describes the tortoise as slow moving but eventually getting where it wanted to go."
"When they went to Australia, they saw a sea turtle swimming next to the ship."
When we went to the zoo, we saw the tortoise enclosure which was designed to look like a desert.
Because I had a blister on my foot, I moved like a tortoise when we went to see the turtle enclosure that was a mixed environment of dry and marshy wet land.
Tortuous reasoning refers to a person's logical thinking which goes in different directions from what some might consider normal or acceptable.
2. Descriptive of anything that is extremely complex or intricate: Some legal arguments presented in court trials can be very tortuous, making them very difficult to understand by those who are not lawyers.3. Pertaining to being devious or deceitful: Thomas was not very straightforward and he was quite tortuous as he tried to make his wife believe that he loved her even though she knew that he was having a relationship with another woman.
4. Etymology: from Latin tortuosus, from tortus, "twisting, a twist, a winding"; from Latin torquere, "to twist".
Go to this Word A Day Revisited Index
so you can see more of Mickey Bach's cartoons.
2. Not straightforward; circuitous; devious: "The story had a tortuous plot."
"The politician had so much tortuous reasoning that we simply could not believe anything she said."
3. Highly involved; complex: "There were so many tortuous legal procedures that it took more than a year before there was a final decision."2. Twisted; strained: "The mountain roads were torturous and required careful attention in order to drive safely."
Although tortuous and torturous both come from the Latin word torquere, "to twist", their primary meanings are distinct.
Tortuous means "twisting" (a tortuous road) or by extension "complex" or "devious."
Torturous refers primarily to torture and the pain associated with it; however, torturous also can be used in the sense of "twisted" or "strained", and tortured is an even stronger synonym; such as, "tortured reasoning".