overfell

Verb

overfall (third-person singular simple present overfalls, present participle overfalling, simple past overfell, past participle overfallen)

1. (transitive) To fall on or spill over so as to cover (something).
   • But her laugh stuck in her throat, for at that moment a shadow overfell the two houses1927, The Argosy - Volume 1, Issues 9-12, page 22
2. (transitive) To change or affect so as to pervade (something); to come over
   • From thence King Hakon proceeded up the Dovrefield; but as he was going over the mountains he road all day after a ptarmigan, which flew up beside him , and in this chase a sickness overfell him, which ended in his death ; and he died on the mountains.1889, Snorri Sturluson, Samuel Laing, Rasmus Bjørn Anderson, The Heimskringla
3. (intransitive) To fall over; to spill from an edge or height.
   • I had arrived at this conclusion, and was meditating on my possible conduct under the circumstances, as I groped my way gingerly enough in the dark shadow of a long crumbling wall, where the ivy clustered and overfell, when round a slight bend, obscured by straggling bushes , I came upon the most...1900, Muriel Hine, “A Gipsy Wooing”, in The Windsor Magazine, volume 11, page 511
4. (intransitive) To fall over; to topple.
   • Then back-toppling, crashing back – a dead weight flung out to wrack, Horse and riders overfell.1919, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Complete Poetical Works of Elizabeth Barrett Browning, page 300

See all 6 meanings of overfall