shrieve

English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ʃɹiːv/

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -iːv

Etymology 1

See sheriff.

Noun

shrieve (plural shrieves)

1. Obsolete form of sheriff.
   • 1591, unknown author, The Troublesome Reign of King John:

     Please it your Majesty, here is the shrieve of Northamptonshire, with certain persons that of late committed a riot, and have appealed to your Majesty beseeching your Highness for special cause to hear them.

   • c. 1604–1605 (date written), William Shakespeare, “All’s Well, that Ends Well”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, (please specify the act number in uppercase Roman numerals, and the scene number in lowercase Roman numerals):

     I know him: he was a botcher's 'prentice in Paris, from whence he was whipped for getting the shrieve's fool with child: a dumb innocent that could not say him nay.

Usage notes

• Also appears capitalised, particularly when used as a title.

Related terms

• shrieval
• shrievalty

Etymology 2

See shrive.

Verb

shrieve (third-person singular simple present shrieves, present participle shrieving, simple past shrieved, past participle shrieved or shriven)

1. Obsolete form of shrive.
   • 1764, Horace Walpole, The Castle of Otranto:

     […] he ordered [father Jerome] to be called and shrieve the prisoner.

   • 1798, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, The Rime of the Ancyent Marinere:

     He'll shrieve my soul, he'll wash away
     The Albatross's blood.

   • 1808 February 22, Walter Scott, “Canto First. The Castle.”, in Marmion; a Tale of Flodden Field, Edinburgh: […] J[ames] Ballantyne and Co. for Archibald Constable and Company, […]; London: William Miller, and John Murray, →OCLC, stanza XXII, page 44:

     The jealous churl hath deeply swore,
     That, if again he venture o’er,
     He shall shrieve penitent no more.

2. (obsolete) To question.
   • 1596, Edmund Spenser, “The Faerie Queene”, in Henry John Todd, editor, The Works of Edmund Spenser, published 1869, page 243:

     But afterwards she gan him soft to shrieve,
     And wooe with fair intreatie, to disclose
     Which of the nymphes his heart so sore did mieve: