screed

Definition

A piece of writing (such as an article, letter, or list) or a speech, especially if long.

Etymology

From Middle English screde [and other forms], a variant of shrede (“fragment, scrap; strip of cloth; strip cut off from a larger piece; band or thread woven into fabric; element, streak”) (whence shred (noun)), from Old English sċrēad, sċrēade (“a piece cut off; paring, shred”), from Proto-Germanic *skraudō (“a piece, shred; a cut, crack”), from *skraudaną (“to cut up, shred”), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)ker- (“to cut off”). The English word is cognate with Old Frisian skrēd. Doublet of escrow, scroll, and shred.

Example Sentences

• "Eh, Mr Henry! but the carle gae him a screed o' doctrine! Ye might hae heard him a mile down the wind—He routed like a cow in a fremd loaning."
• "I see it's three o'clock in the morning and I've written whole screeds when I only intended to write a short note!"
• "When he [Herman Melville] had finished the first part of his novel [Pierre; or, The Ambiguities], and printed it, the publishers would have nothing to do with it. They claimed they had been deluded into accepting a villainous and blasphemous screed against religion and morality and all right living."

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