[f. TWIST v. + -ING1.] The action of the verb TWIST.
† 1. Pruning, clipping. (In quot. attrib.) rare.
1535. Coverdale, Song Sol. ii. 12. The floures are come vp in the felde, the twystinge tyme is come [Vulg. Tempus putationis advenit].
2. The spinning of thread, etc.; twining, wreathing, plaiting; also with in (in quot. 1812 fig. the swearing in of a Luddite), and attrib. in quot. a. 1673 app. concr.
1552. Huloet, Twystyng wande, as wyker or osyer, uimen, inis, uimineus, a, um, of twystyng roddes.
1577. B. Googe, Heresbach’s Husb., 38 b. Flaxe and Hempe … serueth for webbes of Linnen, and twysting of Cordes.
1599. in Archæologia, LXIV. 382. For mending the twisting wheele.
1649. Milton, Eikon., vi. Wks. 1851, III. 386. They … have to our Saviours crown of thorns no right at all. Thornes they may find anow of thir own gathering, and thir own twisting.
1668. Wilkins, Real Char., 247. Making several vegetable or animal substances into Thred. Twisting,… Spinning.
a. 1673. T. Horton, Serm., xxii. (1679), 160/1. He can gather a Rod of these boughes, and make a scourge of these twistings.
1688. R. Holme, Armoury, III. xxi. (Roxb.), 253/2. A Twisting wheele…. This is an engine wherewith 2, 3 or more silk thrids are twisted, or turned all together into one entire double thrid.
1812. Chron., in Ann. Reg., 86/2. Thirty-eight were committed to Lancaster gaol, to take their trials for having administered the abominable and unlawful oath, known by the term of twisting-in.
1825. J. Nicholson, Operat. Mechanic, 421. The motions of both machines, excepting those of that set of twisting-spindles facing the opposite company, are then struck into geer.
1844. G. Dodd, Textile Manuf., vi. 188. There does not seem to be any definite distinction among silk-throwsters, between spinning, twisting, and throwing.
1878. A. Barlow, Hist. & Princ. Weaving, xxx. 312. It is not to be wondered at that attempts should be made to perform twisting-in by mechanical means.
3. Wringing, screwing; spiral turning; contortion, distortion; fig. perversion or wresting of sense; slang, a scolding; a trouncing.
1725. W. Halfpenny, Sound Building, 29. The Angles … in the Figure, do represent the Twisting of each Piece.
1738. Swift, Pol. Corversat., Introd. 16. The Twistings and Movements, and different Postures of the Body.
1776. Da Costa, Elem. Conchol., vii. 148. The Vermiculi in general are of no determinate or fixed regular shape, from their windings and twistings.
1808. Lady Sarah Lyttelton, Corr. (1913), 14. A few pretty distortions of the features or graceful twistings of the body.
1818–20. E. Thompson, trans. Cullen’s Nosol. Method. (ed. 3), 224. Pain in the belly with a sense of twisting.
1827. Faraday, Chem. Manip., xix. (1842), 523. This should be done without any twisting or distortion of the glass.
1833. Marryat, P. Simple, xvi. I say, Bill, if them were we, what a precious twisting we should get to-morrow at six bells!
1890. Daily News, 1 Dec., 6/2. Telling me that it [the letter] is being twisted this way and that, and asking me to put a stop to the twisting process.
4. Tortuous course; intricate winding; turning this way and that; fig. evasion, prevarication; also turning aside, or about; rotation.
1768. Tucker, Lt. Nat. (1834), I. 76. To follow … all the twistings and crossings, and entanglements in those intricate subjects that have hitherto perplexed the learned world.
1856. F. Perthes, Mem., II. vi. 94. What toil and trouble, what twisting and turning this undertaking has cost me.
1872. Liddon, Elem. Relig., iv. 154. A second regards sin as a twisting or perversion of the will from the right way.
1875. Bennett & Dyer, Sachs’ Bot., 188. A useful arrangement is … that all the parts … by a single twisting of the axis … assume those positions which are most favourable for the functions of the leaves…. In the terminal buds of such shoots this twisting is no longer necessary.
1886. Athenæum, 10 July, 39/1. The twistings and eddyings of the political current.
