1. A snare, gin; a noose. Obs. exc. dial. Also fig.
c. 1380. Metr. Hom. (Vernon MS.), in Herrig, Archiv, LVII. 247/1. Lord, what þing schal passe quite And in þeos snarles not beo tan.
1387. Trevisa, Higden (Rolls), II. 385. Maydens of Athene were compelled as it were to snarles and grenes. Ibid., VI. 27. To brynge þe peple þat was so bygiled þe faster in snarl.
1601. Breton, Blessed Weeper, xxi. Shame bad me weepe … to feele how I was feltred in The wretched snarles of wicked nature’s knots.
1829. Brockett, N. C. Gloss. (ed. 2), Snarl, the snare itself, made of wire.
1893. in Eng. Dial. Dict., s.v., They put this snarl or snirrup roond t’gills an’ click t’fish oot.
2. A tangle, knot, ravel.
1609. Ev. Woman in Hum., V. i. in Bullen, O. Pl., IV. Curle not the snarles that dwell upon these browes.
1611. Cotgr., Grippets,… the rufflings, or snarles of ouer-twisted thread.
1741. Compl. Family-Piece, II. ii. 331. Let your Hair be round,… twist it neatly without Gaping or Snarles.
1750. Glandville, in W. Ellis. Mod. Husb., IV. II. 73. I found it [the hairworm] to twist itself all up into a close Snarle.
1836. Haliburton, Clockm., xviii. (1862), 79. To wind off a snarl of ravellins as slick as if it were on a reel.
1854. Susan Warner, Old Helmet, I. 113. The green silk was in a great snarl.
1897. Ed. W. Sandys, in Outing, XXX. 434/2. The worm … lying upon the bottom like a snarl of black thread.
b. fig. or in fig. context.
1631. Quarles, Samson, xii. The day’s at hand, wherein thou must untie The Riddle’s tangled Snarle.
1675. J. Smith, Chr. Relig. Appeal, I. 18. Here was … a snarle in his fortune requiring the aid of a Divine Solution.
1710. S. Palmer, Proverbs, 73. That men and women shou’d be … in a continu’d snarle, contradiction, hatred, and infinite disorders.
1860. [Mrs. M. C. Harris], Rutledge, viii. 111. Dorothy has got her account with the grocer in a great snarl, and hasn’t done much better with the butcher, and I can’t make them all come out right.
1889. Spectator, 13 April, 508/2. Our children will see how this Irish snarl is unravelled.
3. U.S. A swarm, large number.
1855. Mrs. Whitcher, Widow Bedott P., xxiii. A cheaper minister, and one that hadn’t such a snarl o’ young ones.
4. A knot in wood. (Cf. SNARLY a.1 2.)
1881–. in dial. glossaries (Leic., Warw.).
a. 1891. Tribune Book of Sports, 12 (Cent.). Let Italian or Spanish yew be the wood, clear of knots, snarls, and cracks.
5. attrib. and Comb., as snarl-headed adj., -knot, -preventer.
1790. R. Tyler, Contrast, II. ii. (1887), 39. The snarl-headed curs fell a-kicking and cursing of me.
1847. Halliw., Snarl-knot, a very intricate one.
1867. Smyth, Sailor’s Word-bk., Snarl-knot. A northern expression for a knot that cannot be drawn loose.
1884. Illustr. Lond. N., 27 Sept., 291/1. Mr. Brooks’s ‘Snarl preventor’ is a new form of thread-wire which pounces on snarled threads.
