SHREW

Wicked; malicious. [Obs.] Chaucer.

Originally, a brawling, turbulent, vexatious person of either sex, but now restricted in use to females; a brawler; a scold. A man . . . grudgeth that shrews [i. e., bad men] have prosperity, or else that good men have adversity. Chaucer. A man had got a shrew to his wife, and there could be no quiet in the house for her. L'Estrange.

Any small insectivore of the genus Sorex and several allied genera of the family Sorecidæ. In form and color they resemble mice, but they have a longer and more pointed nose. Some of them are the smallest of all mammals.

To beshrew; to curse. [Obs.] "I shrew myself." Chaucer.