[f. L. complicāt- ppl. stem of complicāre, f. com- together + plicā-re to fold.]
† 1. trans. To fold, wrap, or twist together; to intertwine; to entangle one with another. Obs.
a. 1631. Donne, in Selections (1840), 86. Sin enwrapped and complicated in sin.
1652. Gaule, Magastrom., 10. Is not this scroal or book here said to be complicated or rolled up or together.
1664. Power, Exp. Philos., I. 34. There they lie all dead, twisted and complicated all together, like a knot of Eels.
1691. Ray, Creation, II. (1704), 334. Vessels curl’d, circumgyrated and complicated together.
† 2. To intertwine, unite, or combine intimately.
1621. Burton, Anat. Mel., III. i. III. iii. (1651), 428. By this happy union of love … the heavens [are] annexed, and divine souls complicated.
a. 1677. Barrow, Serm. (1810), V. 64. With this wisdom are always complicated no less evident marks of goodness.
1691. T. H[ale], Acc. New Invent., cxxii. The Wisdom of our Ancestors in Complicating the Office of the Lord Admiral with the Lord Mayors in its Conservacy.
3. To combine or mix up with in a complex, intricate, or involved way.
[a. 1631. Donne, in Selections (1840), 113. God hath complicated almost all our bodily diseases of these times, with an extraordinary sadness.]
1673. Lady’s Call., II. § 3. 87. When ’tis in a matter of trust ’tis complicated with treachery also.
1732. Arbuthnot, Rules of Diet (J.). When a disease is complicated with other diseases, one must consider that which is most dangerous.
1848. Macaulay, Hist. Eng. (1872), I. ii. 94. A point at which the history of the great English revolution begins to be complicated with the history of foreign politics.
a. 1853. Robertson, Lect. (1858), 270. The subject is complicated with difficulties.
† 4. To form by complication; to compound. Obs.
1624. Donne, Devotions, 68. Monsters compiled and complicated of diuers parents & kinds.
1690. Locke, Hum. Und., II. xii. (ed. 3), 79. Ideas … such as … a Man, an Army, the Universe … complicated of various simple Ideas.
1707. E. Ward, Hud. Rediv. (1715), II. ix. An execrable Deed; So complicated of all Evils, That it outdid the very Devils.
5. To make complex or intricate (as by the introduction of other matter); to render involved or complex. Cf. COMPLICATED 3.
1832. trans. Sismondi’s Ital. Rep., x. 228. The war of Lombardy was complicated by its connection with another war.
a. 1856. Sir W. Hamilton, Logic (1860), II. App. 465. These schemes [of logical notations] thus tend rather to complicate than to explicate.
1860. Tyndall, Glac., ii. § 27. 382. Where no medial moraines occur to complicate the phenomenon.
1879. Lockyer, Elem. Astron., ix. li. 323. The phenomena of the tides are greatly complicated by the irregular distribution of land.
6. intr. (for refl.) To become complicated. rare.
1873. H. Spencer, Study Sociol., xiii. (1877), 324. Effects which as they diffuse complicate incalculably.
