twistical

English

Etymology

From twist +‎ -ical.

Adjective

twistical (comparative more twistical, superlative most twistical)

1. (archaic, colloquial, regional) Crooked; tortuous. [From late 18th century]
   • 1791, Isaac Hunt, Rights of Englishman‎, London: J. Bew, page 28:

     […] I will meet Mr. Paine again at Point-no-Point, very properly so named because, as he observes, “it continually recedes at a distance a-head; and when you have got as far as you can go there is no point at all.” So it is with Mr. Paine’s twistical reflections on religion and government:

   • 1871, John William De Forest, Overland, New York: Sheldon, Chapter 15, p. 79,

     He had queer twistical ways of reasoning which often proved the contrary of what he seemed to want to prove;

   • 1965, Sid Fleischman, The Ghost in the Noonday Sun‎, Boston: Little, Brown, Chapter , p. 11:

     […] then he showed the white of his teeth in a twistical smile.

   • 2001, Jamie O’Neill, At Swim, Two Boys‎, London: Scribner, Part 1, Chapter 6, p. 136:

     ‘There’s many still believes a priest could make a toad of you. All it would take was a twistical squint off his eyes. […] ’

2. (archaic, colloquial, regional) Perverse; unfair; dishonest. [From late 18th century]
   • c. 1797 John Leland, remark made while preaching, cited in Berkshire Historical and Scientific Society, Berkshire Book, 1892, Volume 1, p. 283,

     Godward he is an excellent man, manward he is rather twistical.

   • 1836, Thomas Chandler Haliburton, The Clockmaker, Halifax, NS: J. Howe, p. 111,

     […] well, he was a deep, sly, twistical lookin chap, as you een amost ever seed.

   • 1936, Helen Albee Monsell, chapter 15, in The Secret of the Chestnut Tree‎, Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, pages 156-157:

     […] if you can fix Melinda Smoot for behaving so twistical to her, I’ll thank you forever.

References

“twistical”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.