curving

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curve

(kûrv)

a. A line that deviates from straightness in a smooth, continuous fashion.

b. A surface that deviates from planarity in a smooth, continuous fashion.

c. Something characterized by such a line or surface, especially a rounded line or contour of the human body.

2. A relatively smooth bend in a road or other course.

a. A line representing data on a graph.

b. A trend derived from or as if from such a graph: "Once again, the politicians are behind the curve" (Ted Kennedy).

4. A graphic representation showing the relative performance of individuals as measured against each other, used especially as a method of grading students in which the assignment of grades is based on predetermined proportions of students.

5. Mathematics

a. The graph of a function on a coordinate plane.

b. The intersection of two surfaces in three dimensions.

c. The graph of the solutions to any equation of two variables.

6. Baseball A curve ball.

7. Slang Something that is unexpected or designed to trick or deceive.

v. curved, curv·ing, curves

v.intr.

To move in or take the shape of a curve: The path curves around the lake.

v.tr.

1. To cause to curve.

2. Baseball To pitch (a ball) with a curve.

3. To grade (students, for example) on a curve.

[From Middle English, curved, from Latin curvus; see sker- in Indo-European roots. N., sense 6, short for curve ball.]

curv′ed·ness n.

curv′y adj.

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

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Adj.

curving - having or marked by a curve or smoothly rounded bend; "the curved tusks of a walrus"; "his curved lips suggested a smile but his eyes were hard"

curved

curving

adjective

Having bends, curves, or angles:

bending, crooked, curved.

Translations

curvatura

References in classic literature ?

Her figure, too, was straight as a dart, a little portly, perhaps, but curving into magnificent outlines, which were half accentuated by the strange costume which she wore.

View in context

Then it was as if an invisible yet intensely heated finger were drawn through the heather between me and the Martians, and all along a curving line beyond the sand pits the dark ground smoked and crackled.

View in context

It was a peninsula, protected on three sides by the curving river.

View in context

She looked at him with curving lips; and even he, who had watched her often, could not tell whether that curve was of scorn or mirth.