From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.44 [gcide]:
Wrest \Wrest\, verb (used with an object) [imp. & p. p. {Wrested}; p. pr. & vb. n. {Wresting}.] [OE. wresten, AS. wr?stan; akin to wr?? a twisted band, and wr[=i]?n to twist. See {Writhe}.]
1. To turn; to twist; esp., to twist or extort by violence; to pull of force away by, or as if by, violent wringing or twisting. ''The secret wrested from me.'' --Milton.
Our country's cause, That drew our swords, now secret wrests them from our hand. --Addison.
They instantly wrested the government out of the hands of Hastings. --Macaulay.
2. To turn from truth; to twist from its natural or proper use or meaning by violence; to pervert; to distort.
Wrest once the law to your authority. --Shak.
Thou shalt not wrest the judgment of thy poor. --Ex. xxiii. 6.
Their arts of wresting, corrupting, and false interpreting the holy text. --South.
3. To tune with a wrest, or key. [Obs.]
From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.44 [gcide]:
1. The act of wresting; a wrench; a violent twist; hence, distortion; perversion. --Hooker.
2. Active or moving power. [Obs.] --Spenser.
3. A key to tune a stringed instrument of music.
The minstrel . . . wore round his neck a silver chain, by which hung the wrest, or key, with which he tuned his harp. --Sir W. Scott.
4. A partition in a water wheel, by which the form of the buckets is determined.
{Wrest pin} (Piano Manuf.), one of the pins around which the ends of the wires are wound in a piano. --Knight.
{Wrest plank} (Piano Manuf.), the part in which the wrest pins are inserted.
From WordNet (r) 2.0 [wn]:
verb
1: obtain by seizing forcibly or violently, also metaphorically; "wrest the knife from his hands"; "wrest a meaning from the old text"; "wrest power from the old government"
From Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0 [moby-thes]:
114 Moby Thesaurus words for "wrest": anamorphism, anamorphosis, arrogate, asymmetry, avulse, badger, bend, blackmail, buckle, claim, color, confiscate, confuse, contort, contortion, crook, crookedness, crumple, cut out, demand, deracinate, detorsion, deviation, dig out, dig up, disentangle, disproportion, distort, distortion, draw, draw out, dredge, dredge up, elicit, eradicate, evolve, evulse, exact, exaction, excavate, excise, exsect, extort, extortion, extract, extricate, force from, garble, get out, gnarl, gouge, gouge out, grub up, imbalance, irregularity, knot, levy blackmail, lopsidedness, mine, miscolor, pervert, pick out, pinch, pluck out, pluck up, pry loose from, pull, pull out, pull up, quarry, quirk, rake out, remove, rend, rend from, rending, rip, rip from, rip out, ripping, root out, root up, screw, shake down, snatch from, spring, squeeze, take out, tear from, tear out, tearing, torsion, tortuosity, turn, turn awry, twist, unearth, unravel, unsymmetry, uproot, usurp, warp, weed out, withdraw, wrench, wrench from, wrenching, wrest out, wresting, wring, wring from, wringing, writhe, wry
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