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# Word of The Day
- URL: https://goodoil.news/word-of-the-day-184/
- Published: 2024-07-16T18:15:02.000Z
- Updated: 2024-07-16T18:15:02.000Z
- Author: The Editor
- Tags: General

**Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for July 16, 2024 is:**

**harry** • \\HAIR-ee\\ • *verb*  

To harry someone or something is to harass or torment them by or as if by constant attack.

// The visiting team *harried* the home team relentlessly during the first quarter.

[See the entry >](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/harry?ref=goodoil.news)

**Examples:**  

“His side played like a team who understood the magnitude of a fixture laced with bitterness. They hassled and *harried* their opponents from the first minute and were rewarded with the biggest margin of victory in this fixture since 1956.” — Henry Clark, *The Mail on Sunday* (London, UK), 4 Feb. 2024

**Did you know?**  

*Harry* has been a part of English for as long as there has been anything that could be called English. It took the form *hergian* (“to make predatory raids, ravage, wage war”) in Old English and *harien* (“to plunder, ravage, torment, pursue, drag”) in Middle English, passing through numerous variations before finally settling into its modern spelling. While its oldest senses were violent indeed (and *harry* can still be used today to mean “to make a pillaging or destructive raid upon”) one is just as likely today to encounter the word in less [martial](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/martial?ref=goodoil.news), though still [fraught](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/fraught?ref=goodoil.news), contexts that involve someone or something being troubled or worried. Holiday travelers may be harried, for example, by numerous stresses (traffic, flight delays, lost baggage, etc.), while sports teams are often said to harry one another while vying for control of the ball, puck, or what-have-you.