shrill
Etymology

From Late Middle English schrille, shirle, shrille, possibly from the earlier shil, schille, from Old English scill, of Germanic origin.

The word is cognate with Icelandic skella, Low German schrell.

Pronunciation
  • (RP, America) IPA: /ʃɹɪl/
Adjective

shrill (comparative shriller, superlative shrillest)

  1. High-pitched and piercing.
    The woods rang with shrill cries of the birds.
    • 1599 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Life of Henry the Fift”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC ↗, [Act III, prologue], page 77 ↗, column 1:
      Suppoſe, that you haue ſeene / The well-appointed King at Douer Peer, / Embarke his Royaltie: and his braue Fleet, / With ſilken Streamers, the young Phebus fayning; / [...] Heare the ſhrill Whiſtle, which doth order giue / To ſounds confus'd.
    • 1812, Lord Byron, “Canto I”, in Childe Harold's Pilgrimage. A Romaunt, London: Printed for John Murray, […]; William Blackwood, Edinburgh; and John Cumming, Dublin; by Thomas Davison, […], →OCLC ↗, stanza XIII.4, page 11 ↗:
      Let winds be shrill, let waves roll high, / I fear not wave nor wind; / Yet marvel not, Sir Childe, that I / Am sorrowful in mind; [...]
    • 1816 June – 1817 April/May (date written), [Mary Shelley], chapter VI, in Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus. […], volume III, London: […] [Macdonald and Son] for Lackington, Hughes, Harding, Mavor, & Jones, published 1 January 1818, →OCLC ↗, [https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=emu.010001278703;view=1up;seq=126 page 118]:
      But I discovered no trace of him, and was beginning to conjecture that some fortunate chance had intervened to prevent the execution of his menaces; when suddenly I heard a shrill and dreadful scream.
  2. Having a shrill voice.
  3. Sharp or keen to the senses.
  4. (figuratively, derogatory, especially of a complaint or demand) Fierce, loud, strident.
Translations Translations Translations Translations Verb

shrill (shrills, present participle shrilling; simple past and past participle shrilled)

  1. To make a shrill noise.
    • 1579, Immeritô [pseudonym; Edmund Spenser], “Nouember. Ægloga Vndecima.”, in The Shepheardes Calender: […], London: […] Iohn Wolfe for Iohn Harrison the yonger, […], →OCLC ↗, folio 45, recto ↗:
      And all wee dwell in deadly night, / O heauie herſe. / Breake we our pipes, that ſhrild as lowde as Larke, / O carefull verſe.
    • c. 1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, The Famous Historie of Troylus and Cresseid. […] (First Quarto), London: […] G[eorge] Eld for R[ichard] Bonian and H[enry] Walley, […], published 1609, →OCLC ↗, [Act V, scene iii]:
      Harke how Troy roares, how Hecuba cries out, / How poore Andromache ſhrils her dolours foorth, / Behold deſtruction, frenzie, and amazement, / Like witleſſe antiques one another meete, / And all crie Hector, Hectors dead, O Hector.
    • 1714, J[ohn] Gay, “Saturday; or, The Flights”, in The Shepherd’s Week. In Six Pastorals, London: […] R. Burleigh […], →OCLC ↗, page 56 ↗, lines 47–50:
      Not ballad-ſinger plac'd above the croud, / Sings with a note ſo ſhrilling ſweet and loud, / Nor pariſh clerk who calls the pſalm ſo clear, / Like Bowzybeus ſooths th' attentive ear.
      An adjectival use.
    • 1791, Homer, W[illiam] Cowper, transl., “[The Iliad.] Book XVII.”, in The Iliad and Odyssey of Homer, Translated into Blank Verse, […], volume I, London: […] J[oseph] Johnson, […], →OCLC ↗, page 481 ↗, lines 913–918:
      They, as a cloud of ſtarlings or of daws / Fly ſcreaming ſhrill, warn'd timely of the kite / Or hawk, devourers of the ſmaller kinds, / So they ſhrill—clamouring toward the fleet, / Haſted before Æneas and the might / Of Hector, nor the battle heeded more.
    • 1842, Alfred Tennyson, “Morte d’Arthur”, in Poems. […], volume II, London: Edward Moxon, […], →OCLC ↗, page 13 ↗:
      [F]rom them rose / A cry that shiver'd to the tingling stars, / And, as it were one voice, an agony / Of lamentation, like a wind, that shrills / All night in a waste land, where no one comes, / Or hath come, since the making of the world.
    • 1880 November 11, Lew[is] Wallace, chapter IV, in Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, […], →OCLC ↗, book fourth, page 195 ↗:
      [H]e paused, while his hands clutched, and his voice shrilled with passion— [...]
Translations Noun

shrill (plural shrills)

  1. A shrill sound.
    • 1591, Ed[mund] Sp[enser], “The Ruines of Time ↗”, in Complaints. Containing Sundrie Small Poemes of the Worlds Vanitie. […], London: […] William Ponsonbie, […], →OCLC ↗, part 6:
      [W]hen at laſt / I heard a voyce, which loudly to me called, / That with ſuddein ſhrill I was appalled.



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