maze

maze   (māz)    n.   An intricate, usually confusing network of interconnecting pathways, as in a garden; a labyrinth. A physical situation in which it is easy to get lost: a maze of bureaucratic divisions. A graphic puzzle, the solution of which is an uninterrupted path through an intricate pattern of line segments from a starting point to a goal. Something made up of many confused or conflicting elements; a tangle: a maze of government regulations. tr.v.   mazed, maz·ing, maz·es Chiefly Southern U.S. To bewilder or astonish. To stupefy; daze. See Regional Note at possum. [Middle English mase, confusion, maze, from masen, to confuse, daze, from Old English āmasian, to confound; see amaze.]

Maze

Maze\, n. [OE. mase; cf. OE. masen to confuse, puzzle, Norweg. masast to fall into a slumber, masa to be continually busy, prate, chatter, Icel. masa to chatter, dial. Sw. masa to bask, be slow, work slowly and lazily, mas slow, lazy.]

1. A wild fancy; a confused notion. [Obs.] --Chaucer.

2. Confusion of thought; perplexity; uncertainty; state of bewilderment.

3. A confusing and baffling network, as of paths or passages; an intricacy; a labyrinth. "Quaint mazes on the wanton green." --Shak.

Or down the tempting maze of Shawford brook. --Wordaworth.

The ways of Heaven are dark and intricate, Puzzled with mazes, and perplexed with error. --Addison.

Syn: Labyrinth; intricacy. See Labyrinth.

maze  (n.)

Main Entry: maze
Pronunciation: 'mAz
Function: noun
: a path complicated by at least one blind alley and used in learning experiments and in intelligencetests