Skriech

Part of speech: verb, noun

Definitions

1. A harsh, piercing, high-pitched cry, or the act of letting out such a sound
2. Describing a sharp, shrill noise made by a voice or animal, or the act of producing one
3. A piercing shriek, as from a person or bird, or to give out such a loud, grating sound

Etymology: In Scots, a "skriech" is a shrill cry, the screech of an owl, or the act of screeching. The usual Scots form is "skreich," with "skriegh" and "skriech" as spelling variants, and all of them come from the same Middle English verb that gave Standard English "shriek." That verb, "shriken," probably came into English from Old Norse, which had a similar verb, "skrækja," meaning to shriek. Scots kept the older, more vowel-heavy spelling and sound, while the English form settled into "shriek" and was later pulled toward "screech." The Scots sense is more specific than the English one. In northern dialects, "skreich o' day" was a phrase for dawn, the moment the first birds began calling. The word thus ties a human sound of alarm to the first sounds of the morning, a connection the standard English "shriek" has lost.