To tangle; entangle; entwine confusedly; involve in a tangled or knotted mass, as thread or hair mingled together loosely.
Hence To involve; perplex; confuse.
To treat confusedly; jumble; muddle.
To disentangle; disengage the threads or fibers of (a woven or knitted fabric, a rope, a mass of tangled hair, etc.); draw apart thread by thread; unravel: commonly with out: in this sense (the exact contrary of the first sense), originally with out, ravel out being equivalent to unravel.
To become entangled or snarled, as the ends of loose and dangling threads, or a mass of loose hair.
Hence To become involved or confused; fall into perplexity.
To curl up, as a hard-twisted thread.
To become untwisted or disjoined, as the outer threads of a loosely made fabric or the strands of a rope; become disjoined thread by thread; fray, as a garment at the edges: commonly with out.
Hence To suffer gradual disintegration or decay.
To make a minute and careful examination in order to straighten what is confused, unfold what is hidden, or clear up what is obscure; investigate; search; explore.
Same as rabble.
noun.
A raveled thread; a raveling.
noun.
plural The broken threads cast away by women at their needlework.
noun.
In weaving, a serrated instrument for guiding the separate yarns when being distributed and wound upon the yarn-beam of a loom, or for guiding the yarns wound on a balloon; an evener; a separator.
noun.
Also, in Scotch spelling, raivel.
noun.
A snarl; a complication.