curl

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

• intransitive verb To twist (the hair, for example) into ringlets or coils.
• intransitive verb To form into a coiled or spiral shape.
• intransitive verb To decorate with coiled or spiral shapes.
• intransitive verb To raise and turn under (the upper lip), as in snarling or showing scorn.
• intransitive verb Sports To lift (a weight) by performing a curl.
• intransitive verb To form ringlets or coils.
• intransitive verb To assume a spiral or curved shape.
• intransitive verb To move in a curve or spiral.
• intransitive verb Sports To engage in curling.
• noun Something with a spiral or coiled shape.
• noun A coil or ringlet of hair.
• noun A treatment in which the hair is curled.
• noun The act of curling.
• noun The state of being curled.
• noun Sports A weightlifting exercise using one or two hands, in which a weight held at the thigh or to the side of the body is raised to the chest or shoulder and then lowered without moving the upper arms, shoulders, or back.
• noun Any of various plant diseases in which the leaves roll up.

from The Century Dictionary.

• To turn, bend, or form into ringlets, as the hair.
• To dress or adorn with or as with curls; make up the hair of into curls.
• To bring or form into the spiral shape of a ringlet or curl; in general, to make curves, turns, or undulations in or on.
• To take the form of curls or ringlets, as hair.
• Hence To assume any similar spiral shape; in general, to become curved, bent, or undulated: often with up.
• To turn and twist about; writhe; squirm.
• To play at curling. See curling.
• noun A ringlet of hair.
• noun Hence Something having a similar spiral form; any undulation, sinuosity, or flexure.
• noun Specifically, a winding or circling in the grain of wood.
• noun A disease of peach-trees which causes great distortion of the leaves. It is caused by an ascomycetous fungus, Taphrina deformans. See Taphrina.
• noun In mathematics, the vector part of the quaternion resulting from the performance of the operation i.d/dx + j.d/dy + k.d/dz on any vector function iX + jY + kZ.
• In cricket, to cause (the ball) to curve in the air: said of the bowler.
• In cricket, to curve in the air: said of the ball.
• noun A disease of potatoes in which the shoots become curled up and deformed. It is attributed to chlorosis.
• noun A disease of other plants in which the leaves curl up.—Leaf-curl. See leaf-curl.

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

• noun A ringlet, especially of hair; anything of a spiral or winding form.
• noun An undulating or waving line or streak in any substance, as wood, glass, etc.; flexure; sinuosity.
• noun A disease in potatoes, in which the leaves, at their first appearance, seem curled and shrunken.
• noun (Bot.) See under Blue.
• transitive verb To twist or form into ringlets; to crisp, as the hair.
• transitive verb To twist or make onto coils, as a serpent's body.
• transitive verb To deck with, or as with, curls; to ornament.
• transitive verb To raise in waves or undulations; to ripple.
• transitive verb (Hat Making) To shape (the brim) into a curve.
• intransitive verb To contract or bend into curls or ringlets, as hair; to grow in curls or spirals, as a vine; to be crinkled or contorted; to have a curly appearance.
• intransitive verb To move in curves, spirals, or undulations; to contract in curving outlines; to bend in a curved form; to make a curl or curls.
• intransitive verb Scot. To play at the game called curling.

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

• noun A piece or lock of curling hair; a ringlet.
• noun A curved stroke or shape.
• noun A spin making the trajectory of an object curve.
• noun curling Movement of a moving rock away from a straight line.