Agresses

Part of speech: verb

Definitions

1. To attack or act with hostility toward someone or something
2. To assault or behave aggressively in a threatening manner toward another
3. To initiate hostile action or offensive conduct against a person or entity

Etymology: The root of this verb is a literal step. Latin "aggredi" combined "ad-", meaning "to," with "gradi," meaning "to step" or "walk," so its basic sense was "to walk toward" or "approach." Only later did it come to mean "attack," and that hostile sense is the one that passed into English. English did not inherit "aggress" directly from Latin. It was formed in English as a back-formation from "aggression" and "aggressor," which were borrowed from Latin and French forms of the same root. Speakers reversed the usual pattern by taking the shorter noun-derived pieces and treating them as a verb, so "aggress" means "to commit an unprovoked attack" and "agresses" is simply its third-person singular present form.