Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- adj. Gnarled; misshapen.
- adj. Slang Remarkable; outstanding.
- adj. Slang Unpleasant; disgusting.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- Having rough or distorted knots.
Wiktionary
- adj. having or characterized by gnarls; gnarled
- adj. US slang dangerous
- adj. US slang unpleasant, awful, ugly
- adj. slang excellent, attractive
- adj. US slang Of music or a sound, harsh
GNU Webster's 1913
- adj. Full of knots; knotty; twisted; crossgrained.
WordNet 3.0
- adj. used of old persons or old trees; covered with knobs or knots
Etymologies
- gnarl + -y. (Wiktionary)
Examples
“A tube can be rigged to reach bass in gnarly cover, to pick off cruisers in open water, or to coax strikes from even the most finicky bedding bass.”
“I know you don't hear the word gnarly too much in conservative circles, but you're gonna start hearing it in the future!" the 44-year-old ex-actor told a crowd of about 200 assembled youths.”
“Thea Andrews, joking, "1891 Victorian England was a petty gnarly place -- I like that I actually got the word gnarly in a Victorian description.”
“The long and narrow peninsulas of the Midcoast region, which stretch from the Brunswick / Bath area through to the Camden / Rockland area, are often described as gnarly fingers that stretch into the sea.”
“It's important that us whites call gnarly looking black women beautiful, because we must, or we aren't human otherwise.”
“Yep, had a buddy place three cams near his feeders in Sept. Had some pic's of some "gnarly" deer.”
“No word yet on cause of death, but since he was just in Africa, we can only assume he had the ebola virus, or the hanta virus, or salmonella, or some kind of gnarly rhino wound.”
“Now that I've gotten the whole Twitter thing out of the way, I find myself wishing that the fiasco that is Bike Month was also out of the way, since things are getting pretty bad or "gnarly," as they say in singletrack-slaying parlance out there.”
“Baldwin has endeared himself to aspiring evangelical hipsters by interspersing outmoded California surferisms like "gnarly" and "awesome" into his sermons.”
“However, that inviting, carefree feeling is dulled by the dialogue's prolific inclusion of phrases like "gnarly" and referring to people as "dog".”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘gnarly’.
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Interesting words
A list of words that are odd or words that I have looked up.
concupiscence, brize, scree, scoria, forestaff, spanaemia, valetudinarianism, distasture, pyrethrum, laudanum, gentian, bicameral and 11250 more...
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UK Usage - Find US Equivalent
All these terms have a (different) American English equivalent. Wonder if you can identify them?
abridgement (abri..., accoutrement, accoutre, acknowledgement (..., opposite, advert, adaptor, adapter, sticking plaster, advertise, adviser (advisor ..., adze, aesthete and 1196 more...
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Mountain Biking
Words that relate to bicycling or mountain biking
crank, podium, attack position, bonk, rock garden, babyheads, bunny hop, chain, chainring, clipless, freeride, slicks and 206 more...
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aujourdui's list
totally fantabulous words
wombat, spiffing, gnarly, splendiferous, yoda, rockocity, shmexy, rebrella, coolio, liger, ravenous, crudsicles and 12 more...
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Starts with a silent letter
...with grateful thanks to telofy (for "cnidarian"), and to the song "Crazy ABC's" by Barenaked Ladies.
cnidarian, mnemonic, chthonic, ptarmigan, psoriasis, psittacine, bdellium, aisle, czar, gnarly, gnat, gnaw and 82 more...
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Costa Vida
The Costal Life
surf, carve, tubular, rip curl, curl, froth, floater, tweak, wafting, off the wall, pocket, rad and 39 more...
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Rad Words.
Put any Rad word, any at all.
super, rad, awesome, amazing, cool, nerdfightastic, fantastic, spectacular, groovy, funky, dishy, sick and 5 more...
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Kalli's Words
redundant, munchkin, escapade, natch, boom, fap, geek, nocturnal, pedantic, tactile, conversant, oxymoron and 188 more...
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Twitter favourites
The new favourite words of people on Twitter.
A script searches Twitter for "X is my new favourite word" and adds it to this list.
See also:
thunderfuck, incredible, merp, sara, flopparoo, smother, fugly, buer, plum, canny, nefelibata, cuntbucket and 2434 more... -
Twitter favorites
The new favourite words of people on Twitter.
A script searches Twitter for "X is my new favorite word" and adds it to this list.
See also:
unfathomably, glice, cuh, fab, ciggaty, doll, thuggin, oxymoronic, pineapple, succubutt, griming, cheeky and 3027 more... -
strangelyrouge's Words
glockenspiel, gewgaw, jetsam, flotsam, gripe, grab, wench, whilst, betwixt, hither, thither, yonder and 1034 more...
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SoSheShall's list
slurp, coeur, slurple, glop, perp, fluarxx, ropechno, herrherr, burrduhherrherr, sloppy, cheezie balls, eccentric and 634 more...
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List Erine
cool mint antiseptic
shalom, cattywampus, bourgeoisie, aerophile, traverse, grotto, epicurean, ex cathedra, nautilus, epitaph, lathe, continuum and 753 more...
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Mollusque's miscellany
A mixture of words that I like or have commented on, along with ones parked here so they'd be listed somewhere or remind me of lists I want to make.
oranger, monographer, preoccupied, bu, bobization, coinventor, tetrapyloctomy, borgmannian, suspercollate, manhug, mancrush, obituarist and 604 more...
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My Words
Words that I use regularly and consider mine.
zen, poser, savvy, angst, flustered, bitter, whatsoever, farfetched, indeed, scenario, inevitable, salvage and 134 more...
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The History of Cool
Words that mean "cool" around the world and through the ages.
cool, awesome, wild, stylin', groovy, neat, nifty, swell, great, tubular, radical, bitchin' and 188 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for gnarly.
avivamagnolia
~ Something (or someone) both obscure and hairy.
"Yow! - the tuned assembler implementation of BitBlt is really gnarly!"
~ From a similar but less specific usage in surfer slang. Jan 18, 2009
bilby "They cannot be too gnarly and crabbed and rusty to look at. The gnarliest will have some redeeming traits even to the eye. You will discover some evening redness dashed or sprinkled on some protuberance or in some cavity. It is rare that the summer lets an apple go without streaking or spotting it on some part of its sphere. It will have some red stains, commemorating the mornings and evenings it has witnessed; some dark and rusty blotches, in memory of the clouds and foggy, mildewy days that have passed over it; and a spacious field of green reflecting the general face of Nature,--green even as the fields; or a yellow ground, which implies a milder flavor,--yellow as the harvest, or russet as the hills." - 'Wild Apples', Henry David Thoreau. Dec 14, 2007