unravel means to cause (something) to no longer be ravelled or tangled; to disentangle, to untangle. It carries an Arena rating of 1556, earned across 2 head-to-head judged battles.
Among words judged in Lexicurio's Arena, unravel ranks #1,401 of 14,361 for Most Ingenious Words, #1,956 of 14,308 for Most Malleable Words, #2,317 of 14,444 for Most Exacting Words, #2,350 of 14,448 for Most Incisive Words.
unravel is pronounced /(ˌ)ʌnˈɹævəl/.
Why “unravel” is a great word
To separate or disentangle the threads of something woven or knitted, or, figuratively, to resolve or clarify a complex or confused situation. From the prefix un- (denoting reversal or the opposite action) + the verb ravel (meaning to entangle or to disentangle). Unlike "ravel," a word of ambiguous intent, or "solve," which suggests a neat, final answer, unravel emphasizes the patient, often fraught process of picking apart. It is the meticulous work of following a single loose yarn in a sweater until the whole garment lies in a heap of orderly string; it is tracing a rumor back through whispered corridors to its first, forgotten utterance; it is the careful loosening of grief’s tight weave. The act seeks not merely to end confusion, but to witness the precise architecture of its collapse.
Etymology
From un- (suffix denoting the inverse of the specified action) + ravel. cognates * Dutch ontrafelen (“to unravel”)
verb
- To cause (something) to no longer be ravelled or tangled; to disentangle, to untangle.“Mother couldn’t unravel the ball of wool after the cat had played with it.”
- To separate the threads of (something knitted or woven, such as clothing or fabric).“Stop playing with the seam of the tablecloth! You’ll unravel it.”
- To separate the connected or united parts of (something); to throw (something) into disorder; to confound, to confuse, to disintegrate.“to unravel the broad consensus which was created”
- To clear (something) from complication or difficulty; to investigate and solve (a mystery, a problem, etc.); to disentangle, to unfold, to work out.“to unravel the confusion to unravel a plot”
- To reverse or undo (something); to annul, to negate.“For everie time thou admitſt mee after, to thy / Pillovv, I'le ſtrike of an hundred pound, / Till all the debts be unravel'd: […]”
- To become no longer ravelled or tangled.
- Of threads: to become separated from something knitted or woven, such as clothing or fabric; also, of something knitted or woven: to separate into threads; to come apart.“[C]onſider him as a King, and what favours hath he beſtowed on his Subjects! and then, that his curteſies might not unravell or fret out, hath bound them with a ſtrong border and a rich fringe, a Triennial Parliament.”
- Of a thing: to have its connected or united parts separated; to be thrown into disorder; to become confused or undone; to collapse.“[W]hen men doe not iſhue out of a danger by a doore of Gods opening unto them, but breake through the vvall, (as Jerome by perjury) by violent and unvvarrantable vvayes, their minds are daily haunted vvith ſcruples and perplexities, even ſometimes to dolefull diſtraction; beſides, ſuch eſcapes never grovv proſperous, rather eaſing than curing, and the comfort got by them unraueleth againe, as it h”
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