serpentine

• POS: Adjective, Noun
• HYPHEN: ser=pen=tine

CIDE DICTIONARY

serpentine, a. [L. serpentinus: cf. F. serpentin.].

 Resembling a serpent; having the shape or qualities of a serpent; subtle; winding or turning one way and the other, like a moving serpent; anfractuous; meandering; sinuous; zigzag; as, serpentine braid.  [1913 Webster]
"Thy shape
Like his, and color serpentine."  [1913 Webster]

serpentine, n. [Cf. (for sense 1) F. serpentine, (for sense 2) serpentin.].

•  A mineral or rock consisting chiefly of the hydrous silicate of magnesia. It is usually of an obscure green color, often with a spotted or mottled appearance resembling a serpent's skin. Precious, or noble, serpentine is translucent and of a rich oil-green color.  [1913 Webster]

  " Serpentine has been largely produced by the alteration of other minerals, especially of chrysolite."  [1913 Webster]
•  A kind of ancient cannon.  [1913 Webster]

serpentine, v. i. 

 To serpentize.  Lyttleton.  [1913 Webster]

OXFORD DICTIONARY

serpentine, adj., n., & v.
--adj.
1 of or like a serpent.
2 coiling, tortuous, sinuous, meandering, writhing (the serpentine windings of the stream).
3 cunning, subtle, treacherous.
--n.
1 a soft rock mainly of hydrated magnesium silicate, usu. dark green and sometimes mottled or spotted like a serpent's skin, taking a high polish and used as a decorative material.
2 Skating a figure of three circles in a line.
--v.intr. move sinuously, meander.

Idiom

serpentine verse a metrical line beginning and ending with the same word.

Etymology

ME f. OF serpentin f. LL serpentinus (as SERPENT)

THESAURUS

serpentine

Byzantine, Machiavellian, Machiavellic, Mephistophelian, aberrant, aberrative, acute, affluent, ambagious, amphibian, anfractuous, anguiform, anguine, arch, artful, astute, bad, batrachian, bent, billowing, billowy, cagey, canny, circuitous, circumlocutory, clever, colubriform, complex, complicated, confluent, conniving, convoluted, convolutional, coursing, crafty, crawling, creeping, crocodilian, crooked, cunning, curvaceous, curvate, curvated, curve, curved, curvesome, curviform, curvilineal, curvilinear, curving, curvy, cute, deceitful, decurrent, deep, deep-laid, defluent, demoniac, demonic, departing, designing, desultory, deviant, deviating, deviative, deviatory, devilish, devious, diabolic, diabolical, diffluent, digressive, diplomatic, discursive, eellike, errant, erratic, evil, excursive, feline, flexuose, flexuous, flowing, fluent, fluxional, fluxive, foxy, froggy, geosynclinal, guileful, gulfy, gushing, incurvate, incurvated, incurved, incurving, indented, indirect, ingenious, insidious, inventive, involute, involuted, involutional, knowing, labyrinthine, lizardlike, lumbriciform, mazy, meandering, meandrous, notched, ophidian, out-of-the-way, pawky, planetary, plotting, politic, pouring, profluent, racing, rambling, ready, recurvate, recurvated, recurved, recurving, repent, reptant, reptile, reptilelike, reptilian, reptiliform, reptiloid, resourceful, rivose, rivulose, roundabout, roving, ruffled, running, rushing, satanic, saurian, saw-toothed, sawtooth, scheming, scored, serpentiform, serpentile, serpentlike, serpentoid, serrate, serrated, serried, sharp, shifting, shifty, shrewd, sinuate, sinuose, sinuous, slick, slippery, slithering, sluggish, sly, smooth, snake-shaped, snakelike, snaking, snaky, sneaky, sophistical, stealthy, strategic, stray, streaming, subtile, subtle, supple, surging, surgy, swerving, tactical, tidal, toadish, toothed, torsional, tortile, tortuous, trickish, tricksy, tricky, turning, twisting, twisty, undirected, undulant, unhallowed, vagrant, veering, vermicular, vermiculate, vermiform, viperiform, viperish, viperlike, viperoid, viperous, vipery, vortical, vulpine, wandering, wary, wavy, whorled, wily, winding, wormlike, wreathlike, wreathy, zigzag

ROGET THESAURUS

serpentine

Convolution

N convolution, winding, convolution, involution, circumvolution, wave, undulation, tortuosity, anfractuosity, sinuosity, sinuation, meandering, circuit, circumbendibus, twist, twirl, windings and turnings, ambages, torsion, inosculation, reticulation, rivulation, roughness, coil, roll, curl, buckle, spiral, helix, corkscrew, worm, volute, rundle, tendril, scollop, scallop, escalop, kink, ammonite, snakestone, serpent, eel, maze, labyrinth, knot, convoluted, winding, twisted, tortile, tortive, wavy, undated, undulatory, circling, snaky, snake-like, serpentine, serpent, anguill, vermiform, vermicular, mazy, tortuous, sinuous, flexuous, anfractuous, reclivate, rivulose, scolecoid, sigmoid, sigmoidal, spiriferous, spiroid, involved, intricate, complicated, perplexed, labyrinth, labyrinthic, labyrinthian, labyrinthine, peristaltic, daedalian, kinky, knotted, wreathy, frizzly, crepe, buckled, raveled, spiral, coiled, helical, cochleate, cochleous, screw-shaped, turbinated, turbiniform, in and out, round and round, a can of worms, Gordian knot.