different between assault vs drygulch

English

Etymology

From Middle English assaut, from Old French noun assaut, from the verb asaillir, from Latin assili?, from ad (“towards”) + sali? (“to jump”). See also assail. Spelling Latinized around 1530 to add an l.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /??s??lt/
• (regional, California) IPA^(key): /??s?lt/

Noun

assault (countable and uncountable, plural assaults)

1. A violent onset or attack with physical means, for example blows, weapons, etc.
   • 1856-1858, William H. Prescott, History of the Reign of Philip II

     The Spanish general prepared to renew the assault.

   • 1814, William Wordsworth, The Excursion, Book 5

     Unshaken bears the assault / Of their most dreaded foe, the strong southwest.

2. A violent onset or attack with moral weapons, for example words, arguments, appeals, and the like

3. (criminal law) An attempt to commit battery: a violent attempt, or willful effort with force or violence, to do hurt to another, but without necessarily touching his person, as by lifting a fist in a threatening manner, or by striking at him and missing him.
4. (singular only, law) The crime whose action is such an attempt.
5. (tort law) An act that causes someone to apprehend imminent bodily harm.
6. (singular only, law) The tort whose action is such an act.
7. (fencing) A non-competitive combat between two fencers.

Synonyms

• onfall, onrush

Coordinate terms

• battery

Derived terms

Translations

Verb

assault (third-person singular simple present assaults, present participle assaulting, simple past and past participle assaulted)

1. (transitive) To attack, physically or figuratively; to assail.

   Tom was accused of assaulting another man outside a nightclub.

   Loud music assaulted our ears as we entered the building.

2. (transitive) To threaten or harass. (Can we add an example for this sense?)

Translations

Middle French

Noun

assault m (plural assauls)

1. (chiefly military) assault; attack

English

Alternative forms

• dry gulch
• dry-gulch

Etymology

Because in the American West, outlaws often killed people as they passed through a dry gulch; or because cattle rustlers drove stolen animals off the edge of such a gulch. (ref. John Ayto 1998)

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /?d?????lt?/
• (US) IPA^(key): /?d?a?.??lt?/

Verb

drygulch (third-person singular simple present drygulches, present participle drygulching, simple past and past participle drygulched)

1. (US, slang) To murder; to attack, assault, especially in an ambush.
   • 1940, Raymond Chandler, Farewell, My Lovely, Penguin 2010, p. 77:

     ‘Then one of them got into the car and dry-gulched me.’

   • 2006, Thomas Pynchon, Against the Day, Vintage 2007, p. 722-3:

     You've delivered yourselves into the hands of capitalists and Christers, and anybody wants to change any of that steps across ’at frontera, they're drygulched on the spot—though I'm sure you'd know how to avoid that, Dwayne.

Derived terms

• drygulcher

Translations