assailant
Americannoun
-
assailants
plural
adjective
noun
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of assailant
From the Middle French word assaillant, dating back to 1525–35. See assail, -ant
Explanation
A wife who sends a vase sailing at her husband's head might be considered an assailant, or attacker. Or, they might be playing a game of dodgeball with the furniture. Assailant comes from the Latin ad- meaning "at" and salire meaning "to leap." Leap at someone and you're an assailant — someone who attacks. You'll usually hear this word when lawyers or police are talking about attacks, because most people use its synonym attacker in casual conversation. Have you ever been attacked by ants, looking down to see your foot covered in them? Think of the word ant when you spell the word assailant to remember its ending.
Vocabulary lists containing assailant
Fever 1793
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Franklin Roosevelt, "Four Freedoms" (1941)
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This Week in Words : December 23 - 29, 2017
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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 Megan didn’t name him as her assailant at first.
From Salon ● Apr. 30, 2026
Shomrim—a Jewish community security organization—said its members stopped the assailant and held him until the police arrived.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 29, 2026
She said the assailant had a local accent, with a trace of another, and a shiny hairless chest.
From BBC ● Mar. 12, 2026
The assailant, identified as Anthony Kazmierczak, had the sort of online posting history that you would expect and had told a neighbor that he might be arrested at an upcoming Omar event.
From Slate ● Jan. 31, 2026
However, when the scene is reenacted many times under comparable lighting conditions by a court investigating the case, the victim correctly identifies the race of the assailant only about 80 percent of the time.
From "Innumeracy: Mathematical Illiteracy and Its Consequences" by John Allen Paulos
A security source in Gao, south of Tessalit, told AFP that "no clashes took place" during the rebel forces' capture of Tessalit, and that regular troops had already evacuated when the assailants entered.
From Barron's ● May 1, 2026
A local man, identified by authorities as Ahmed el Ahmed, helped end it when he rushed one of the two assailants and wrestled the man’s weapon away.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 15, 2025
Although Guimaraes enjoyed international support, his assailants haven’t been identified.
From Salon ● Jun. 3, 2025
After escaping a pair of masked assailants, he brings the police around; the sauna, you will have guessed, is clean as a whistle.
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 28, 2024
Not able to find the youth, C.P. drove slowly toward downtown, hoping to find the boy or his assailants.
From "The Best of Enemies" by Osha Gray Davidson
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.
