sally
noun
a sortie of troops from a besieged place upon an enemy.
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salvy.
sally
1 American
[sal-ee]
/ ˈsæl i /
noun
sallies
plural
-
a sortie of troops from a besieged place upon an enemy.
-
a sudden rushing forth or activity.
-
an excursion or trip, usually off the main course.
-
an outburst or flight of passion, fancy, etc..
a sally of anger.
-
a clever, witty, or fanciful remark.
-
Carpentry. a projection, as of the end of a rafter beyond the notch by which the rafter is fitted over the wall plate.
verb (used without object)
sallies,
present (3rd person singular)
sallied,
past participle, past
sallying
present participle
-
to make a sally, as a body of troops from a besieged place.
-
to set out on a side trip or excursion.
-
to set out briskly or energetically.
-
(of things) to issue forth.
Sally
2
American
[sal-ee]
/ ˈsæl i /
Or
Sallie
noun
sally
1
British
/ ˈsælɪ /
noun
-
a sudden violent excursion, esp by besieged forces to attack the besiegers; sortie
-
a sudden outburst or emergence into action, expression, or emotion
-
an excursion or jaunt
-
a jocular retort
verb
-
to make a sudden violent excursion
-
(often foll by forth) to go out on an expedition, etc
-
to come, go, or set out in an energetic manner
-
to rush out suddenly
Sally
2
British
/ ˈsælɪ /
noun
sally
3
British
/ ˈsælɪ /
noun
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
sallysimple
-
salliessimple
-
have salliedperfect
-
has salliedperfect
-
am sallyingprogressive
-
are sallyingprogressive
-
is sallyingprogressive
-
have been sallyingperfect progressive
-
has been sallyingperfect progressive
Past
-
salliedsimple
-
had salliedperfect
-
was sallyingprogressive
-
were sallyingprogressive
-
had been sallyingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of sally
1535–45; < Middle French saillie attack, noun use of feminine past participle of saillir to rush forward < Latin salīre to leap
Explanation
A sally is a military action, a sudden charge in the direction of the enemy. A sally sometimes has the advantage of taking the opposing army by surprise. When soldiers who have been on the defensive, having retreated to a foxhole or fort, make an abrupt offensive attack on their opponents, it's a sally. Another word for this kind of sally is a sortie. You can also call a sudden funny remark or comeback a sally, especially during a witty, back-and-forth, or bantering kind of conversation. The word comes from the Middle French saillie, "a rushing forth," from the Latin salire, "to leap."
Vocabulary lists containing sally
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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:
As with the adoption of Casual Fridays, the first sally in the contemporary battle for comfort, there remains confusion as to what exactly constitutes acceptable office attire.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 28, 2025
The tiny river fly, known as scarce yellow sally, was thought to have died out a few decades ago.
From BBC ● Aug. 21, 2023
“It’s the same shade in every music video since sally Walker. Suddenly I wear a black wig in a club scene & its an issue.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 6, 2021
It was possible for me to sally forth without the threat of young adult bankruptcy.
From Salon ● Sep. 13, 2020
The lawyer’s sally induced guffaws, a courtroom flare-up that Judge Tate’s dour gaze soon extinguished.
From "In Cold Blood" by Truman Capote
Connecticut State Police described the bodies found at the foreclosed home as “skeletal remains” and identified one of them as the previous co-owner, Sally Anne Cash, who would be 54 years old today.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 20, 2026
When Sally, 74, bought her two-bedroom flat in 2021, she hoped it would be the home she could peacefully retire in.
From BBC ● Jul. 7, 2026
At the hospital, Jack learns that the man behind the wheel was Governor George McRyan, a presidential hopeful polling extremely well in the primaries, who left a campaign event with Sally as his escort.
From Salon ● Jul. 4, 2026
All England Club chief Sally Bolton expressed relief the protest would not continue during the tournament.
From Barron's ● Jun. 29, 2026
Sally turned bright red and stopped fiddling with her hair.
From "The Lions of Little Rock" by Kristin Levine
She and her brood live high up in the trees, jumping from branch to branch and occasionally making exploratory sallies on the ground.
From Salon ● May 11, 2025
They’re still getting to know one another—making conversational sallies, seeking to befriend or impress or charm.
From The New Yorker ● Sep. 9, 2019
Thus stoked, our commander in chief sallies forth to meet with probably the most illustrious collection of aides since Groucho hooked up with Chico and Harpo.
From Washington Post ● Dec. 11, 2017
He sallies out on his yacht sometimes to count containers on Miami cargo ships in the harbor, keeping tabs on the comings and goings of freight.
From Slate ● Nov. 29, 2015
Cluny’s horde was only making spasmodic sallies from the ditch now.
From "Redwall" by Brian Jacques
I sallied forth, seeking a companion to go with me to see Metallica at a 6th Street club.
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 27, 2022
Yet despite a government determined to constrain their ambition and advancement, they sallied forward to become a lawyer and educator, respectively.
From Washington Post ● Mar. 21, 2022
One of these counter-offensives came in the form of an appearance from billionaire Howard Schultz, Starbucks' former chairman, who sallied over to Buffalo to vaguely dissuade pro-union workers from unionizing.
From Salon ● Dec. 25, 2021
The original movie succeeded in wasting Emmanuelle Béart and Kristin Scott Thomas, and it wasn’t really until Ferguson sallied into film No. 5, toting an assassin’s rifle, that progress began to be made.
From The New Yorker ● Jul. 26, 2018
Boldly enough the animals sallied forth to meet them, but this time they did not have the easy victory that they had had in the Battle of the Cowshed.
From "Animal Farm: A Fairy Story" by George Orwell
All that sallying takes her down some unexpected byways.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 20, 2026
Finally, some first-timers are valiantly sallying forth — the kind of debuts that’ll be more and more rare as times only get tougher for the restaurant industry under COVID-19.
From Seattle Times ● Oct. 10, 2020
This is the most appealing side of Arbus: you feel a gust of Whitman, or of her near-contemporary Allen Ginsberg, in her sallying forth to compile such tumultuous chronicles of America.
From The New Yorker ● May 30, 2016
And so I decided to embark on my own immersive tour of those Gilded Age vestiges, sallying forth from my East Village apartment to seek the company of its obsessive modern admirers.
From New York Times ● Feb. 27, 2015
In emergencies like these the hero always takes a cold bath and changes his clothes before sallying forth to put a crimp in the villain’s plans.
From The Bandbox by Vance, Louis Joseph
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.
