The term harass was borrowed from French in the early 1600s. Originally spelled with two letter rs, it eventually transitioned to the single r by the eighteenth century. Its usage peaked in literature in 1807 and has been on a decline since then. The French verb it originated from, harasser, had various meanings such as “to repeatedly attack”, “to tire out”, or “to devastate”. While the exact origin of the word is somewhat obscure due to its rarity, etymologists believe it stems from harer, which meant “to set a dog upon”. This root word also influenced the term harry (“repeatedly attack”), and can be traced back to Old Frankish hara, meaning “over here” (used when calling a dog), which ultimately derived from the Proto-Indo-European reconstruction ko, a demonstrative pronoun translating to “this”.
