Meaning

verb utter a shrill cry

adjective having or emitting a high-pitched and sharp tone or tones

adjective being sharply insistent on being heard

originFrom Late Middle English schrille, shirle, shrille (“of a sound: high-pitched, piercing; producing such a sound”), possibly from the earlier shil, schille (“loud, resounding; high-pitched”), from Old English sċill (“sonorous sounding”), of Germanic origin and probably ultimately imitative. The r in the word was introduced by analogy to Middle English skrīke, skrīken, scrēmen, possibly to avoid…

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 3.0