assault vs sortie

assault

noun
  • An act that causes someone to apprehend imminent bodily harm (such as brandishing a weapon). 

  • A non-competitive combat between two fencers. 

  • A violent onset or attack with physical means, for example blows, weapons, etc. 

  • A violent verbal attack, for example with insults, criticism, and the like 

  • An attempt to commit battery: a violent attempt, or willful effort with force or violence, to do hurt to another, but without necessarily touching the person, such as by raising a fist in a threatening manner, or by striking at the person and missing. 

  • The tort whose action is such an act. 

  • The crime whose action is such an attempt. 

verb
  • To threaten or harass. 

  • To attack, physically or figuratively; to assail. 

sortie

noun
  • An act of venturing out to do a task, etc. 

  • An operational flight carried out by a spacecraft involving a return to Earth. 

  • An operational flight carried out by a single military aircraft. 

  • An attack made by troops from a besieged position; a sally. 

  • An act of trying to enter a new field of activity. 

  • An attacking move. 

  • Synonym of sally port (“an entry to or opening into a fortification to enable a sally”) 

  • A series of aerial photographs taken during the flight of an aircraft; (by extension) a photography session. 

verb
  • To carry out a sortie; to sally. 

How often have the words assault and sortie occurred in a corpus of books? (source: Google Ngram Viewer )