devious
- 01 C2 Proficiency
a path or route that is not direct and has many turns.
deviating from a direct or straight course; circuitous or roundabout.
Simple“They took a devious route through the mountains to avoid the main road.”
In context“The explorers followed a devious path through the dense thicket, doubling back several times before finding the hidden valley.”
UsageIn modern English, this literal sense is rare and usually replaced by 'winding' or 'circuitous'.
Synonyms
“As the devious West Country buccaneer Long John Silver in a Muppets movie, he was fully on board with the make-believe, fully on board with the silliness.”
1590s, "out of the common or direct way," from Latin devius (“out of the way, remote, off the main road”), from de via, from de (“off”) (see de-) + via (“way, road”). Compare deviate. Originally in the Latin literal sense; the figurative sense of "deceitful" is first recorded 1630s. Related to deviously, deviousness. Figurative senses of the Latin word were "retired, sequestered, wandering in the byways, foolish, inconsistent."
Etymology adapted from Wiktionary, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.