interweven

Interweven is a verb that means to weave together, interlace, or blend elements so that they form a connected whole. In contemporary English, interweave is the standard form, with interwoven or interweaved as the common past participle forms. Interweven appears primarily as an archaic or historical variant and is rarely used in modern writing.

Etymology and forms. The term derives from inter-, meaning between, combined with weave, the act of forming fabric by interlacing threads. Over time, English settled on interweave as the base verb, with the widely used past forms interwoven and interweaved. Some older or regional texts may feature interweven as a past participle, reflecting historical spelling and irregular verb patterns.

Usage. Interweven is most often encountered in discussions of textiles or tapestry, where multiple threads are deliberately woven to create a single fabric pattern. It also appears in literary, artistic, or rhetorical contexts to describe the merging of ideas, themes, or narrative threads. For example, a writer might interweven different timelines to reveal a larger truth, or a designer may interweave color motifs to unify a collection.

Synonyms and related terms include interweave, interlace, converge, and merge. In modern prose, it is generally clearer to use interweave and its standard past forms, while interweven is typically reserved for historical, scholarly, or stylistic contexts.

See also: weave, interlace, interweave, tapestry, narrative structure.