ravel
Syllables: rav·el/ɹəˈvɛl//ˈɹævəl/
ravel verb: to entwine or tangle (something) confusedly; to entangle.
Verb
ravel (third-person singular simple present ravels, present participle (US) raveling or (UK) ravelling, simple past and past participle (US) raveled or (UK) ravelled)
- To entwine or tangle (something) confusedly; to entangle.
- For the faith of very many men seems a duty so weak and indifferent, is so often untwisted by violence, or ravelled and entangled in weak discourses, or so false and fallacious by its mixture of interest, that though men usually put most confidences in the pretences of faith, yet no pretences are...1653, “Twenty-five Sermons Preached at Golden Grove; Being for the Winter Half-year, […]: Sermon XIII. [Of Lukewarmness and Zeal; or, Spiritual Fervour.] Part II.”, in Reginald Heber, editor, The...
- When paſſive Thouſands ſtretch beneath his Sword, / And freely die at his Imperial Word, / Thoſe wild, unhappy, ſelf-defending Few, / If not deſtroy'd in Time, will ravel all the Clew; […]1706, [Daniel Defoe], “Book VIII”, in Jure Divino: A Satyr. […], London: [P. Hills?], →OCLC, page 188
- Often followed by up: to form (something) out of discrete elements, like weaving fabric from threads; to knit.
- [Magazine staffer about his political team:] Pencils at the ready, keen brains agleam behind intelligent horn rims, these experts spread out to ravel the loose ends of White-Housing, web-spinning spiders for [the presidential candidate].1960 May 28, Walt Kelly, Pogo, comic strip, →ISBN, page 149
- To unwind (a reel of thread, a skein of yarn, etc.); to pull apart (cloth, a seam, etc.); to fray, to unpick, to unravel; also, to pull out (a string of yarn, a thread, etc.) from a piece of fabric, or a skein or reel.
- [Y]ou ſhall haue one vvoman knit more in a hovver then any man can Rauell agen in ſeauen and tvventy yeare.1607, attributed to Thomas Middleton or Cyril Tourneur, The Revengers Tragædie. […], London: […] G[eorge] Eld, […], →OCLC, Act II
- If there be any fault in the verses, I can mend it extempore; for a stitch in a man's stocking not taken up in time, ravels out all the rest.c. 1623 (date written; published 1653), Thomas Middleton, William Rowley, Thomas Dekker, John Ford, “The Spanish Gipsy”, in A[rthur] H[enry] Bullen, editor, The Works of Thomas Middleton […] (The...
- To confuse or perplex (someone or something).
- Often followed by out: to undo the intricacies of (a problem, etc.); to clarify, to disentangle.
- Make you to rouell^([sic]) all this matter out / That I eſſentially am not in madneſſe, / But mad in craft, […]c. 1599–1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, The Tragicall Historie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmarke: […] (Second Quarto), London: […] I[ames] R[oberts] for N[icholas] L[ing] […], published 1604...
- Synonyms:
- iron out, unravel, untangle, absolve, decipher, get to the bottom of, meliorate, puzzle out, reason out, resolve
- To destroy or ruin (something), like unravelling fabric.
- [S]helter, ſhelter, if you be ſeene / All's ravell'd out agen: ſtand there private, / And you'le find the very opportunity / To call you forth, and place you at the Table.c. 1613, Thomas Middleton, William Rowley, “Wit at Several Weapons. A Comedy.”, in Comedies and Tragedies […], London: […] Humphrey Robinson, […], and for Humphrey Moseley […], published 1647, →OCLC...
- Synonyms:
- disintegrate, race, unmake, destroy, annihilate, aerosolize, atomize, benothing, bewreck, blot out
- In the APL programming language: to reshape (a variable) into a vector.
- Often followed by out: of a reel of thread or skein of yarn; or a thread on a reel or a string of yarn in a skein, etc.: to become untwisted or unwound.
- [G]ive him a broad ſide my brave boyes with your Pikes, branch me his ſkin in Flovvers like a Sattin, and betvveene ever Flovver a mortall cut, your Royalty ſhall ravell, […]c. 1608–1610 (date written), Francis Beaumont, Iohn Fletcher, Philaster, or Love Lies a Bleeding. […], 4th edition, London: […] VV[illiam] J[ones] for Richard Hawkins, […], published 1634, →OCLC, Act...
- [S]plit that forked ſtick with ſuch a nick or notch at one end of it, as may keep the line from any more of it ravelling from about the ſtick, then ſo much of it as you intended; […]1653, Iz[aak] Wa[lton], chapter VII, in The Compleat Angler or The Contemplative Man’s Recreation. Being a Discourse of Fish and Fishing, […], London: […] T. Maxey for Rich[ard] Marriot, […], →OCLC...
- Often followed by out: of clothing, fabric, etc.: to become unwoven; to fray, to unravel.
- But the real work of the First Thursday Foundation is remembering, and its biggest gift is knitting back together lives raveled by loss.2011 September 10, Martha T. Moore, “After 9/11, dinner gang raises funds to honor those lost”, in USA Today, McLean, Va.: Gannett Co., →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 07 Jan 2012
- To become entangled or snarled.
- [A]s you vnwinde her loue from him; / Least it ſhould rauell, and be good to none, / You muſt prouide to bottome it on me: / Which muſt be done, by praiſing me as much / As you, in worth diſpraiſe, ſir Valentine.c. 1590–1591 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Two Gentlemen of Verona”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and...
- Yet more there be who doubt his ways not juſt, / As to his edicts, found contradicting, / Then give the rains to wandring thought, / Regardleſs of his glories diminution; / Till by their own perplexities involv'd / They ravel more, ſtill less reſolv'd, / But never find ſelf-ſatisfying ſolution.1671, John Milton, “Samson Agonistes, […].”, in Paradise Regain’d. A Poem. In IV Books. To which is Added, Samson Agonistes, London: […] J[ohn] M[acock] for John Starkey […], →OCLC, page 25, lines...
Noun
ravel (plural ravels)
- A tangled mess; an entanglement, a snarl, a tangle.
- Mr. Urquhart was in sic a ravel after it that when he gies out the first line o' the hunder and nineteenth psalm for singing, says he, 'And so on to the end.'1891, J[ames] M[atthew] Barrie, “The Night-watchers”, in The Little Minister. […], volume I, London; Paris: Cassell and Company, […], →OCLC, page 47
- There was a lovely ravel of sunflowers in the garden. She looked out the window. "There are my sunflowers!" she said.1913, D[avid] H[erbert] Lawrence, “Baxter Dawes”, in Sons and Lovers, London: Duckworth & Co. […], →OCLC, part II, page 380
- Synonyms:
- ravelment
- A confusing, intricate, or perplexing situation; a complication.
- A thread which has unravelled from fabric, etc.; also, a situation of fabric, etc., coming apart; an unravelling.
Proper noun capitalized: Ravel
Ravel
- A male given name.
- A surname.
ravel meaning in Bengali and Kannada
ravel in Bengali
- জট পাকানো, জট খোলা
ravel in Kannada
- ಬಿಡಿಸು
Examples of ravel in a sentence
- What trade would not be the worse of him? […] [M]ake a clerk of him, and he would only ravel the figures; send him to the soldiering, and he would have a sudden impulse to fight on the wrong side.1896, J[ames] M[atthew] Barrie, “Tommy the Scholar”, in Sentimental Tommy: The Story of His Boyhood, London; Paris: Cassell and Company...
- The savannah valley is shadeless, spotted only with the thorny ravel of mesquite bushes.1927 June, D[avid] H[erbert] Lawrence, “Walk to Huayapa”, in Mornings in Mexico, London: Martin Secker, published July 1927, →OCLC, page 31:
Synonyms of ravel
30 more synonymsFewer synonyms
Antonyms
Forms of ravel
| Verb | |
|---|---|
| third-person singular present | ravels |
| present participle US | raveling |
| present participle UK | ravelling |
| past participle US | raveled |
| past US | raveled |
| past participle UK | ravelled |
| past UK | ravelled |
| Noun | |
| plural | ravels |
Origin of ravel
The verb is borrowed from Dutch ravelen, rafelen (“to tangle, become entangled; to fray; to unweave”) [and other forms]; further etymology uncertain. It has been suggested that the verb is originally derived from the noun, but the Oxford English Dictionary regards this as “very uncertain”, and instead regards the noun as having derived from the verb (compare Dutch rafel, raffel (“frayed thread”)). Ravel is a contranym having both the senses of tangling (verb senses 1.1, 1.2, 1.4.1, and 2.3; noun sense 1) and untangling (verb senses 1.3, 1.4.2, 1.4.3, 2.1, and 2.2; noun sense 2). It would appear that the tangling senses predate the untangling ones (as in Dutch), but this is uncertain because the first published uses of both senses of the words occur around the same time.
* As a French surname, from Ravel. * As an English surname, variant of Raffel. * As a German surname, Americanized from Raffel. * As an Indian surname, variant of Raval.
Words formed from ravel
Phrases with ravel
Words that rhyme with ravel
Questions about ravel
- What does ravel mean?
- Ravel means to entwine or tangle (something) confusedly; to entangle.
- What is ravel in Bengali?
- Ravel in Bengali is জট পাকানো, জট খোলা. See Ravel meaning in Bengali.
- How do you use ravel in a sentence?
- What trade would not be the worse of him? […] [M]ake a clerk of him, and he would only ravel the figures; send him to the soldiering, and he would have a sudden impulse to fight on the wrong side.
- What part of speech is ravel?
- Ravel can be a verb, a noun or a proper noun.
- How do you pronounce ravel?
- Ravel is pronounced /ˈɹævəl/ (UK).
- What is the past tense of ravel?
- The past tense of ravel is raveled.
Words near ravel in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: ravel (page history and authors); Ravel (page history and authors); ravel (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); ravel (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
Last updated:
Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-ravel.wav.
Cite this entry: “ravel.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/ravel. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.