tangle

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. v. To mix together or intertwine in a confused mass; snarl.
2. v. To involve in hampering or awkward complications; entangle.
3. v. To catch and hold in or as if in a net; entrap. See Synonyms at catch.
4. v. To be or become entangled.
5. v. Informal To enter into argument, dispute, or conflict: tangled with the law.
6. n. A confused, intertwined mass.
7. n. A jumbled or confused state or condition.
8. n. A state of bewilderment.
9. n. Informal An argument or altercation.
10. n. A large seaweed of the genus Laminaria.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. n. A name of various large species of seaweed, especially Laminaria digitata and L. saccharina. See cut under seaweed. Also called tangle-wrack and hanger.
2. n. A tall, lank person; any long dangling thing.
3. To unite or knit together confusedly; interweave or interlace, as threads, so as to make it difficult to separate them; snarl.
4. To catch or involve as in a snarl; entrap; entangle.
5. To embroil; embarrass; confuse; perplex; involve; complicate.
6. Synonyms To entangle, intertwine, snarl (up).
7. To be entangled or united confusedly.
8. n. A snarl of threads or other things united confusedly, or so interwoven as not to be easily disengaged.
9. n. A device used in dredging, for sweeping the sea-bed in order to obtain delicate forms of marine life, too small or frangible to be obtained by ordinary dredging. It consists of a bar supported on runners, and serving to drag after it a series of masses of hemp, each of which is a sort of mop which entangles the more minute and delicate forms of marine life without injuring them.
10. n. A perplexity or embarrassment; a complication.
11. Froward; peevish.

Wiktionary

1. v. intransitive to become mixed together or intertwined
2. v. intransitive to be forced into some kind of situation
3. v. intransitive to enter into an argument, conflict, dispute, or fight
4. v. transitive to mix together or intertwine
5. v. transitive to catch and hold
6. n. a tangled twisted mass
7. n. a complicated or confused state or condition
8. n. an argument, conflict, dispute, or fight
9. n. mathematics A region of the projection of a knot such that the knot crosses its perimeter exactly four times.
10. n. Any large type of seaweed, especially a species of Laminaria.

GNU Webster's 1913

1. v. To unite or knit together confusedly; to interweave or interlock, as threads, so as to make it difficult to unravel the knot; to entangle; to ravel.
2. v. To involve; to insnare; to entrap.
3. v. To be entangled or united confusedly; to get in a tangle.
4. n. (Bot.) Any large blackish seaweed, especially the Laminaria saccharina. See kelp.
5. n. A knot of threads, or other thing, united confusedly, or so interwoven as not to be easily disengaged; a snarl
6. n. An instrument consisting essentially of an iron bar to which are attached swabs, or bundles of frayed rope, or other similar substances, -- used to capture starfishes, sea urchins, and other similar creatures living at the bottom of the sea.

WordNet 3.0

1. v. force into some kind of situation, condition, or course of action
2. v. disarrange or rumple; dishevel.
3. n. something jumbled or confused
4. n. a twisted and tangled mass that is highly interwoven
5. v. tangle or complicate
6. v. twist together or entwine into a confusing mass