tortuous

Adjective

tortuous (comparative more tortuous, superlative most tortuous)

1. (figuratively, often) Twisted; having many turns; convoluted.
   • The badger made his dark and tortuous hole on the side of every hill where the copsewood grew thick.1848, Thomas Babington Macaulay, The History of England from the Accession of James the Second, volume 1, Porter & Coates, page 243
   • The Southern acquired them because the little Class "B4" 0-4-0 tanks were finding heavy modern rolling stock more and more of a handful, and at war's end the railway had nothing of suitable power but short wheelbase on its books to take their place on the more tortuous of the dock lines.1959 February, G. Freeman Allen, “Southampton—Gateway to the Ocean”, in Trains Illustrated, page 91
2. Oblique; applied to the six signs of the zodiac (from Capricorn to Gemini) that ascend most rapidly and obliquely.
   • Infortunate ascendent tortuous.1872, Walter William Skeat, Chaucer's A Treatise on the Astrolabe
3. (obsolete) Injurious; tortious.