assail
Americanverb (used with object)
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to attack vigorously or violently; assault.
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to attack with arguments, criticism, ridicule, abuse, etc..
to assail one's opponent with slander.
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to undertake with the purpose of mastering.
He assailed his studies with new determination.
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to impinge upon; make an impact on; beset.
His mind was assailed by conflicting arguments.
The light assailed their eyes.
verb
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to attack violently; assault
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to criticize or ridicule vehemently, as in argument
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to beset or disturb
his mind was assailed by doubts
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to encounter with the intention of mastering
to assail a problem
to assail a difficult mountain ridge
Synonym Usage
See attack.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
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assailablenessnoun
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assailernoun
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assailmentnoun
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assailableadjective
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unassailedadjective
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unassailingadjective
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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assailsimple
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assailssimple
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have assailedperfect
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has assailedperfect
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am assailingprogressive
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are assailingprogressive
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is assailingprogressive
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have been assailingperfect progressive
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has been assailingperfect progressive
Past
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assailedsimple
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had assailedperfect
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was assailingprogressive
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were assailingprogressive
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had been assailingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of assail
1175–1225; Middle English asaylen < Old French asalir < Late Latin assalīre, equivalent to Latin as- as- + salīre to leap, spring
Explanation
To assail is to attack or assault — with throwing stars, fists, words or, less tangibly but just as violently, with troubles or doubts. Believe it or not, assail evolved from the ancient Latin word assilire, which means "to jump on." So picture an attacker jumping on you, throwing punches and maybe some insults, too. Because assail also means to ridicule or heap your worries upon someone. As novelist Charlotte Bronte noted, “Conventionality is not morality. Self-righteousness is not religion. To attack the first is not to assail the last.” Think on that.
Vocabulary lists containing assail
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Othello
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
But sociologists in the scholar-activist mold note that Du Bois also believed in using sociological truth in the pursuit of activism, promising in 1906 to “never cease to protest and assail the ears of America.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 25, 2026
I watched this, sitting two rows behind Trump, as he turned and walked out to face the cameras and assail the process that had brought him there.
From Slate ● Jan. 10, 2025
Go ahead, criticize the Biden administration and assail its record.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 30, 2024
The problem is that Walz's cheery Midwestern normalcy has an authenticity to it that's hard to assail.
From Salon ● Aug. 29, 2024
If we make no answer, the Enemy may move Men of his rule to assail King Brand, and Dáin also.’
From "The Fellowship of the Ring" by J.R.R. Tolkien
Meanwhile, the document assails America’s friends across the Atlantic.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 8, 2025
"Shaming personalizes political life; it assails individuals for injustices that are historically, socially and politically organized," political theorist Wendy Brown, who teaches social science at the Institute for Advanced Study, told Salon by email.
From Salon ● May 9, 2022
It’s never especially funny, not because it’s a dystopian downer whose laughs are supposed to stick in your throat, but because it clumsily assails and misses a series of obvious targets.
From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 8, 2022
He assails the sanctification of Malcolm X, saying that his most prominent biographer, the late Columbia University professor Manning Marable, “accords his hero a stature in memory that he lacked in history.”
From New York Times ● Sep. 7, 2021
Should a moment come when a storm assails the unfinished edifice of to-day, then must your majesty raise the national banner, and call upon the German people to fight for federative government and for freedom.
From For Sceptre and Crown, Vol. II (of II) A Romance of the Present Time by Meding, Johann Ferdinand Martin Oskar
The competitive threat posed by cheaper Chinese substitutes has once again assailed semiconductor stocks, leading to dramatic falls in some of the biggest memory chip makers in Asia on Tuesday.
From MarketWatch ● Jul. 28, 2026
Since then, Pratt has assailed Bass for being on a diplomatic trip to Ghana when the fire ignited, despite a forecast of dangerously high winds and “critical fire conditions.”
From Los Angeles Times ● May 21, 2026
He did not respond to a detailed list of questions but assailed the requests in two posts on X, where he has 1.8 million followers.
From Salon ● Apr. 22, 2026
After ChatGPT launched in late 2022, a wave of proposals assailed open development as dangerous.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 17, 2026
Now pain assailed him, and he felt cold.
From "The Fellowship of the Ring" by J.R.R. Tolkien
He has already moved on from assailing the frontier labs to milking them by selling them compute at a steep markup.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 24, 2026
Pratt has been regularly assailing Bass and her record on social media, even as he promotes his new book, “The Guy You Loved to Hate.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 5, 2026
GM went full speed ahead, pouring money into national ad campaigns assailing things like men eating tofu.
From Slate ● Jun. 22, 2025
For his part, Fauci—a veteran of numerous appearances before Congress—held his ground, assailing accusations made against him as “seriously distorted,” “absolutely false,” and “simply preposterous.”
From Science Magazine ● Jun. 3, 2024
The assailing hosts halted, foiled by the silent menace of rock and wall.
From "The Two Towers" by J. R. R. Tolkien
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
