strike backverb

• 1

  To respond to an attack by attacking one's opponent or opponents.

  • When we are struck at without a reason, we should strike back again very hard; I am sure we should—so hard as to teach the person who struck us never to do it again.
  • The she-wolf was angry. She sank her fangs into her mate’s shoulder in reproof; and he, frightened, unaware of what constituted this new onslaught, struck back ferociously and in still greater fright, ripping down the side of the she-wolf’s muzzle.
• 2

  To leave or set out (in a particular direction, often to where one has been).

  • The next day the starboard watch, to which we both belonged, was to be sent ashore on liberty; and availing ourselves of this opportunity, we determined, as soon after the landing as possible, to separate ourselves from the rest of the men without exciting their suspicions, and strike back at once for the mountains.
  • It was in this frame of mind that, striking back from the shore one morning into the windings of an unfamiliar lane, she came suddenly upon the figure of George Dorset.
• 3

  obsoleteTo send (light, heat, a substance) in the direction of its source.

  • […] the lowest [region of the air] beinge next the earth and the waters, is temperat, and by repercussion or striking back of the sunne beames waxeth hoate, and by absence of them is made colde, being subiect to Wynter and Sommer.
  • A direct love begets a Reflect love, as the heat wrought in the earth strikes back a heat up into the aire againe.
• 4

  obsoleteTo push or force (someone or something) away.

  • 1669, uncredited translator, The Vulcano’s, or, Burning and Fire-Vomiting Mountains, by Athanasius Kircher, London: John Allen, Chapter 5, p. 28, […] if you cast a stone thereinto, it being struck back presently, you shall receive it cast forth again with great force.
  • […] by the sound Of those Majestic Words, struck back, they fell to th’ Ground.