Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun A small furrow, ridge, or crease on a normally smooth surface, caused by crumpling, folding, or shrinking.
  • noun A line or crease in the skin, as from age.
  • noun A different or unexpected development, action, or idea.
  • noun A problem or imperfection.
  • intransitive verb To make wrinkles or a wrinkle in.
  • intransitive verb To draw up into wrinkles; pucker.
  • intransitive verb To form wrinkles.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A slight ridge in or raised line on a surface caused by contraction, folding, puckering, or rumpling; a line of corrugation, generally one of a series, either regularly or irregularly disposed; a crease: as, wrinkles in a garment, or in an old man's face; wrinkles (small corrugations) in a rock.
  • To form wrinkles in: contract, fold, or pucker into small ridges and furrows or creases; corrugate; crease.
  • To become contracted into wrinkles; shrink into furrows and ridges; be marked with wrinkles.
  • noun A short pithy piece of information or advice; a valuable hint; a bit of useful knowledge or instruction; a good idea; a trick; a point; a notion; a device.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun Local, U. S. A winkle.
  • intransitive verb To shrink into furrows and ridges.
  • noun A small ridge, prominence, or furrow formed by the shrinking or contraction of any smooth substance; a corrugation; a crease; a slight fold
  • noun hence, any roughness; unevenness.
  • noun colloq. A notion or fancy; a whim.
  • transitive verb To contract into furrows and prominences; to make a wrinkle or wrinkles in; to corrugate.
  • transitive verb Hence, to make rough or uneven in any way.
  • transitive verb [Obs.] to sneer at.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun A small furrow, ridge or crease in an otherwise smooth surface.
  • noun A line or crease in the skin, especially when caused by age or fatigue.
  • noun A fault, imperfection or bug especially in a new system or product; typically, they will need to be ironed out.
  • verb transitive To make wrinkles in; to cause to have wrinkles.
  • verb intransitive To pucker or become uneven or irregular.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • verb become wrinkled or crumpled or creased
  • noun a slight depression in the smoothness of a surface
  • verb make wrinkled or creased
  • noun a minor difficulty
  • verb make wrinkles or creases on a smooth surface; make a pressed, folded or wrinkled line in
  • verb gather or contract into wrinkles or folds; pucker
  • noun a clever method of doing something (especially something new and different)

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English, back-formation from wrinkled, wrinkled, probably from Old English gewrinclod, past participle of gewrinclian, to wind, crease; see wer- in Indo-European roots.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Probably from stem of Old English gewrinclod.

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Examples

Comments

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  • a crease or a pithy piece of information

    decrease and increase?

    February 8, 2013