screech

plural screeches

1. countableA high-pitched strident or piercing sound, such as that between a moving object and any surface.
2. countableA harsh, shrill cry, as of one in acute pain or in fright; a shriek; a scream.

   1 more example

   “Before he was a twel’month ould he had a mouth full o’ great teeth; his hands wor like ’s claws, and his legs wor no thicker nor the handle of a whip, and about as straight as a rapin’ hook; to make the matther worse, he had the gut uv a cormorant, and the whinge, and the yelp, and the screech, and the yowl, was never out of his mouth.”

   1850, Thomas Keightley, The Fairy Mythology, London: H.G. Bohn, page 522

3. NewfoundlanduncountableNewfoundland rum.
4. uncountableA form of home-made rye whiskey made from used oak rye barrels from a distillery.

present singular third person screeches · participle present screeching · participle past screeched · past screeched

1. To make such a sound.

   They said he had caused the fire in some way; be that as it may, he was screeching most horribly.

   1899 February, Joseph Conrad, “The Heart of Darkness”, in Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine, volume CLXV, number M, New York, N.Y.: The Leonard Scott Publishing Company, […], →OCLC, part I, page 213

   4 more examples

   That the night owl should screech before the noonday sun, that the bat should wheel around the bad of beauty […]

   1826, [Mary Shelley], chapter VI, in The Last Man. […], volume III, London: Henry Colburn, […], →OCLC

   "Have you not met them?" "No, I have met nothing but three cormorants, which were sitting on a bit of drift-wood screeching."

   1886, Peter Christen Asbjø￵rnsen, translated by H.L. Brækstad, Folk and Fairy Tales, page 48

   The tide was out, and we drew up amid the strong bracing smell of seaweed, with gulls screeching, wheeling around, and gliding on the wind.

   1947 January and February, O. S. Nock, “"The Aberdonian" in Wartime”, in Railway Magazine, page 8

   AS THE residents of the quiet Midlothian housing estate prepared for the day ahead, the early-morning stillness was disturbed by the sound of screeching brakes and slamming doors.

   2004 April 15, “Morning swoop in hunt for Jodi's killer”, in The Scotsman

2. figurativelyintransitiveTo travel very fast, as if making the sound of a car that is driving too fast.

   1 more example

   You've got to admire their balls. Real Madrid screeched after them: an entire herd, powerful and co-ordinated, salivating and breathing hard, murder in their eyes. So Barcelona moved the ball on, away from them. Forced back, it was played into Víctor Valdés, the goalkeeper, who slotted it to Carles Puyol, who gave it back again.

   2011 December 12, Sid Lowe, “Víctor Valdés epitomises Barcelona's bravery as Real Madrid falter”, in the Guardian