Knot

Climbers must make sure that all knots are both secure and of types that will not weaken the rope.

The obstructive tendency attributed to the knot in spiritual matters appears in a Swiss superstition that if, in sewing a corpse into its shroud, you make a knot on the thread, it will hinder the soul of the deceased on its passage to eternity.

The nurse was brushing knots from the protesting child's hair.

Flowers worthy of paradise, which, not nice art / In beds and curious knots, but nature boon / Poured forth profuse on hill, and dale, and plain.

A knot can be defined as a non-self-intersecting broken line whose endpoints coincide: when such a knot is constrained to lie in a plane, then it is simply a polygon.

I got into a knot when I inadvertently insulted a policeman.

A man shall be perplexed with knots, and problems of business, and contrary affairs.

When preparing to tell stories at a campfire, I like to set aside a pile of pine logs with lots of knots, since they burn brighter and make dramatic pops and cracks.

Jeremy had a knot on his head where he had bumped it on the bedframe.

[T]he Queen who sat / With lips severely placid, felt the knot / Climb in her throat, […]

the knot of the tale

his ancient knot of dangerous adversarie

As they sat together in small, separate knots, they discussed doctrinal and metaphysical points of belief.

When, for instance, he saw a knot of the ruffians on the prairie, discussing, of course, the single topic which then occupied their minds, he would, perhaps, take his compass and one of his sons, and proceed to run an imaginary line right through the very spot on which that conclave had assembled, and when he came up to them, he would naturally pause and have some talk with them, learning their news, and, at last, all their plans perfectly; and having thus completed his real survey he would resume his imaginary one, and run on his line till he was out of sight.

The garden was bounded by a three-foot brick wall with a fringe of wood rails upon the top, and against this wall was leaning a stalwart police constable, surrounded by a small knot of loafers, who craned their necks and strained their eyes in the vain hope of catching some glimpse of the proceedings within.

At corners, under the lights, near drugstores, small knots of white, bright, chattering people showed teeth to each other, pawed each other, whistled for taxis, were whirled away in them, vanished through the doors of drugstores or into the blackness of side streets.

1968, Bryce Walton, Harpoon Gunner, Thomas Y. Crowell Company, NY, (1968), page 20, He pushed through knots of whalemen grouped with their families and friends, and surrounded by piles of luggage.

[I come] to crave a league of amity, And lastly, to confirm that amity With nuptial knot […]

[I]t were very fit, […] to observe carefully this previous betrothing of ourselves, ere we knit the knot that can never be loosed.

Indeed I would advise every ſingle lady, if poſſible, to attend her inamorato, pretty frequently at the card table; […] if he is haſty or pettiſh with any one else in company, she may depend on the ſame fate when once the knot is tied.

Cedric claimed his old yacht could make 12 knots.

In the early stages of reentry, due to the extremely-rarefied air at these altitudes, the space shuttle flew at only one to a few knots equivalent airspeed, even when its actual speed was many thousands of knots.

We knotted the ends of the rope to keep it from unravelling.

For many weeks about my loins I wore / The rope that haled the buckets from the well, / Twisted as tight as I could knot the noose, / And spake not of it to a single soul, / And spake not of it to a single soul, / Until the ulcer, eating through my skin, / Betray'd my secret penance, so that all / My brethren marvell'd greatly.

She knotted her brow in concentration while attempting to unravel the tangled strands.

The party of the papists in England are become more knotted, both in dependence towards Spain, and amongst themselves.

My foot-boy shall eat pheasants, calvered salmons, / Knots, godwits, lampreys: I myself will have / The beards of barbels, served instead of salads […]