as in furies
a bad-tempered scolding woman
Rip Van Winkle went off into the mountains to escape his wife, a shrew who made his life miserable
Synonyms & Similar Words
Relevance
Example Sentences
Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to
show current usage.
Read More
Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors.
Send us feedback.
Recent Examples of shrews
The tiny bodies of weasels, shrews and bats burn energy so fast that skipping even one meal can mean starvation.
—
Leonie Baier, The Conversation, 27 Feb. 2026
In animal studies, TDN helped obese mice and musk shrews lose weight and become more responsive to insulin.
—Aamir Khollam, Interesting Engineering, 5 Aug. 2025
Leonie Baier, The Conversation, 27 Feb. 2026
In animal studies, TDN helped obese mice and musk shrews lose weight and become more responsive to insulin.
—Aamir Khollam, Interesting Engineering, 5 Aug. 2025
Recent Examples of Synonyms for shrews
furies
Noun
-
None could tame its political furies; its covert operations, which killed more than a thousand Americans in Lebanon, Iraq, and Afghanistan; or its expansion, through the creation of like-minded extremist movements, across the Middle East.—
Robin Wright,
New Yorker,
8 Mar. 2026
-
Just as players once had to fight the three furies in later runs of Hades, the Oceanus boss fight requires Melinoë to fight a trio of sirens — each with their own move set, weapons, and health — in order to move forward.—
Fran Hoepfner,
Vulture,
20 Nov. 2025
Cite this Entry
“Shrews.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/shrews. Accessed 20 Mar. 2026.
Copy CitationLove words? Need even more definitions?
Merriam-Webster unabridged
