The quality of being acrid; a sharp, harsh, or bitter taste, smell, or manner.
From Latin acris (sharp, bitter, pungent) combined with -ity (quality suffix). The word directly descends from the Latin root meaning something that bites or irritates.
The ancient Greeks used 'akris' to describe flavors that literally bit your mouth—so when you taste wasabi's acrisy today, you're using a 2,000-year-old description of that exact sensation.
Complete word intelligence in one call. Free tier — 50 lookups/day.