knotty

comparative knottier · comparative more knotty · superlative knottiest · superlative most knotty

1. Of string or something stringlike: full of, or tied up, in knots.

   Their heads are long, their haire curld, and ſeeming rather wooll, then haire; tis blacke and knotty: […]

   1634, T[homas] H[erbert], “A Description of the Sauage Inhabitants [of Ethiopia]”, in A Relation of Some Yeares Trauaile, Begunne Anno 1626. into Afrique and the Greater Asia, […], London: […] William Stansby, and Jacob Bloome, →OCLC, page 14

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   I could a Tale vnfold, vvhoſe lighteſt vvord / VVould harrovv vp thy ſoule, freeze thy young blood, / Make thy tvvo eyes like Starres, ſtart from their Spheres, / Thy knotty and combined locks to part, / And each particular haire to ſtand an end, / Like Quilles vpon the fretfull Porpentine: […]

   c. 1599–1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmarke”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene v], page 257, column 2

2. Of a part of the body, a tree, etc.: full of knots (knobs or swellings); gnarled, knobbly.

   a knotty pine

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   If thou murmur'ſt, I vvwill rend an Oake / And peg thee in his knotty entrailes, till / Thou haſt hovvl'd avvay tvvelve vvinters.

   1610–1611 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tempest”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene ii], page 4, column 2

   How oft on Sundays, when I'd time to tramp, / My rambles led me to a gipsy's camp, / Where the real effigy of midnight hags, / With tawny smoked flesh and tatter'd rags, / Uncouth-brimm'd hat, and weather-beathen cloak, / 'Neath the wild shelter of a knotty oak, / Along the greensward uniformly pricks / Her pliant bending hazel's arching sticks; […]

   1821, John Clare, “[Poems.] The Gipsy’s Camp.”, in The Village Minstrel, and Other Poems, volume I, London: […] [T. Miller] for Taylor and Hessey, […]; and E[dward] Drury, […], →OCLC, page 122

3. figurativelyComplicated or tricky; complex, difficult.

   a knotty problem

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   crop-headed, short-haired

   David Crystal; Ben Crystal (2017–), “not-pated, adj.”, in Shakespeare’s Words

   As for the Paſſions and Studies of the Minde, Auoid Enuie; Anxious Feares; Anger fretting invvards; Subtill and knottie Inquiſitions; Ioyes, and Exhilarations in Exceſſe; Sadneſſe not Communicated.

   1625, Francis [Bacon], “Of Regiment of Health. XXX.”, in The Essayes […], 3rd edition, London: […] Iohn Haviland for Hanna Barret, →OCLC, page 188

   The preſent Argument is the moſt abſtracted that ever I engaged in, it ſtrains my Faculties to their higheſt Stretch; and I deſire the Reader to attend with utmoſt perpenſity; For, I now proceed to unravel this knotty Point.

   1704, [Jonathan Swift], “Section IX. A Digression Concerning the Original, the Use and Improvement of Madness in a Commonwealth.”, in A Tale of a Tub. […], London: […] John Nutt, […], →OCLC, pages 169–170

   He ſaid; the reſt in diff'rent parts divide, / The knotty point vvas urg'd on either ſide; / Marriage, the theme on vvhich they all declaim'd, / Some prais'd vvith vvit, and ſome vvith reaſon blam'd.

   1709, Alexander Pope, “January and May; or, The Merchant’s Tale, from Chaucer”, in The Works of Mr. Alexander Pope, volume I, London: […] W[illiam] Bowyer, for Bernard Lintot, […], published 1717, →OCLC, page 208

   It’s the knottier questions that elicit his cleaving judgments.

   2016 October 3, Tad Friend, “Sam Altman’s Manifest Destiny”, in The New Yorker

   Synonyms: intricate, thorny, complex, complexed, complicate, complicated, convoluted, Gordian · Antonyms: simple, uncomplicated

4. figurativelyOf an austere or hard nature; rugged.

   […] I may erre perhaps in ſoothing my ſelfe that this preſent truth reviv'd, vvill deſerve on all hands to be not ſiniſterly receiv'd, […] but vvith a ſmooth and pleaſing leſſon, vvhich receiv'd hath the vertue to ſoften and diſpell rooted and knotty ſorrovves: […]

   1644, J[ohn] M[ilton], “The Preface”, in The Doctrine or Discipline of Divorce: […], 2nd edition, London: [s.n.], →OCLC, book I, page 6

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   [A] witte in youth, that is not ouer dulle, heauie, knottie and lumpiſhe, but hard, rough, and though ſomwhat ſtaffiſhe, […] ſuch a witte I ſay, if it be, at the firſt well handled by the mother, and rightlie ſmothed and wrought as it ſhould, not ouerwhartlie, and against the wood, by the ſcholemaſter, both for learning, and hole courſe of liuing, proueth alwaies the beſt.

   a. 1569 (date written), Roger Ascham, “The First Booke for the Youth [Teachyng the Brynging vp of Youth]”, in Margaret Ascham, editor, The Scholemaster: Or Plaine and Perfite Way of Teaching Children, to Vnderstand, Write, and Speake, the Latin Tong, […], London: […] John Daye, […], published 1570, →OCLC, folios 5, verso – 6, recto