Besail

verb

verb ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Verb
  1. 1
    To attack or assail; lunge at or toward; assault. archaic, poetic, rare, transitive

    "The civvies and the brakesmen, with clubs they did me besail; They marched me right straight over to the Albany Jail […]"

Example

More examples

"The civvies and the brakesmen, with clubs they did me besail; They marched me right straight over to the Albany Jail […]"

Etymology

From be- (“at, toward”) + sail (“to attack, assail”), from Middle English sailen (“to attack”), short for assailen (“to assail”).

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.