assail
verb/əˈseɪl/
Etymology From Middle English assailen, from Old French assaillir, assalir, from Late Latin assalīre, from Latin ad (“at, towards”) + salīre (“jump”). See also assault.
1
Figuratively, Sometimes To attack with harsh words or violent force.
- Muggers assailed them as they entered an alley.
- Our ears were assailed by her joyous efforts on her new saxophone.
4 more examples
- With greedy force he gan the fort assayle, / Whereof he weend possesse soone to bee, / And win rich spoile of ransackt chastitee.1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book I, Canto VI”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC:
- [L]et us once again assail your ears, / That are so fortified against our story, / What we two nights have seen.c. 1599–1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmarke”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene i]:
- "Unhappy woman!" he observed to himself as he walked down the platform of Templecombe station; "for the next six months or so those children will assail her in public with demands for an improper story!"1914, Saki [pseudonym; Hector Hugh Munro], “The Story-teller”, in Beasts and Super-Beasts […], London: John Lane, The Bodley Head […], →OCLC, page 238:
- 2007, Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o, Wizard of the Crow, Nairobo: East African Educational Publishers, Book 2, Chapter 3, p. 64, He did not like being in crowds, foul smells galore assailing his nostrils.
2
Figuratively To overcome or successfully argue against; defeat.
- "Yes," he said, half musing to himself, "I knew it must exist: the one explanation that accounts for everything and cannot be assailed. We have reached the bed-rock of truth at last."1923, Ernest Bramah [pseudonym; Ernest Brammah Smith], “(please specify the page)”, in The Eyes of Max Carrados, London: Grant Richards, →OCLC:
- We got married immediately after I finished my work […] which should have been the happiest day of my life. […] But, it was not my happiest day. I was assailed by doubts.1942, Zora Neale Hurston, chapter 14, in Dust Tracks on a Road, New York, N.Y.: Arno Press and The New York Times, published 1969, page 258:
- Synonyms
- barrage
- Derived terms
- assailable, assailant, assailer, assailment, reassail, unassailability, unassailed, unassailing
- Related terms
- assault