Other forms: bombarded, bombarding, bombards
To bombard is to attack continuously with fire or with questions. Bombard the city, bombarded with questions, bombard the target.
The continuity is the point in both senses — one shell is not a bombardment and one question is not either. In physics, bombarding a material with particles is how isotopes are made. Note that a bombard was a very early cannon, named from the Latin for a booming sound.
1verbbombardTo attack continuously with fire.
“The army bombarded the city for weeks before it surrendered.”
2verbpressTo press somebody continuously with questions.
“Reporters bombarded the minister with questions as she left the building.”
bombard is a continuous attacking.
Middle French bombarde named an early cannon, from Latin bombus, a booming. Bomb comes from the same boom.
Latin
bombus — buzzing; booming
Middle French
bombarde — a bombard, mortar, catapult"; also "a bassoon-like musical instrument
Middle English
bombard
English, today
bombard
From Middle English bombard, from Middle French bombarde (“a bombard, mortar, catapult"; also "a bassoon-like musical instrument”), from Latin bombus (“buzzing; booming”). The modern pronunciation is from modern French bombarde.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA