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affray

verb
/əˈfɹeɪ/

Etymology

From Middle English affraien (“to terrify, frighten”), borrowed from Anglo-Norman afrayer (“to terrify, disquiet, disturb”) and Old French effreer, esfreer (“to disturb, remove the peace from”) (compare modern French effrayer), from Vulgar Latin *exfridāre. The second part of this is in turn from Frankish *friþu (“security, peace”), from Proto-Germanic *friþuz (“peace”), from *frijōną (“to free; to love”), from Proto-Indo-European *prāy-, *prēy- (“to like, love”). Cognate with Old High German fridu (“peace”), Old English friþ (“peace, frith”), Old English frēod (“peace, friendship”), German Friede (“peace”). More at free, friend.

  1. derived from *prāy-✻
  2. derived from *friþuz✻
  3. derived from *friþu✻
  4. derived from *exfrido✻
  5. derived from effreer
  6. derived from afrayer
  7. inherited from affraien

Definitions

  1. To startle from quiet

    To startle from quiet; to alarm.

  2. To frighten

    To frighten; to scare; to frighten away.

    • That voice doth us affray.

  3. The act of suddenly disturbing anyone

    The act of suddenly disturbing anyone; an assault or attack.

    • A 22-year-old man was also arrested in connection with the incident for affray towards attending paramedics.
  4. ›+ 3 more definitions

    1. A tumultuous assault or quarrel.

      • The patient, who had a full view of the skirmish, was so tickled at the affray, that he burst into a laughter, which broke the quinsey, and cured him.

    2. The fighting of two or more persons, in a public place, to the terror of others.

      • The affray in the busy marketplace caused great terror and disorder.

    3. Terror.

      • full of ghastly fright and cold affray

The neighborhood

Derived

affrayer

Vish — recursive loop

No curated loop yet for affray. Loops are being traced one word at a time while the ingestion pipeline matures.

sense glosses and etymology drawn from English Wiktionary · source · CC-BY-SA