To be timorous is to be frightened. Roderigo: Here is her father's house. I'll call aloud. Iago: Do, with like timorous accent and dire yell / As when, by night and negligence, the fire / Is spied in populous cities. Roderigo: What, ho, Brabantio! Signior Brabantio, ho! From Shakespeare's Othello; Act 1, Scene 1.