WordSift.org about features theory word lists tips acknowledgements Understanding Language @ Stanford. Paste your text into the box. The word shrift is an archaic noun referring to the confession or absolution of sins. These days, 'shrift' is rarely encountered on its own, but it does keep frequent.

Old English scrift 'confession to priest, followed by penance and absolution,' verbal noun from scrifan 'to impose penance,' from an early Germanic borrowing of Latin scribere 'to write' (see (n.)) that produced nouns for 'penance, confession' in Old English and Scandinavian (cf. Nissan serial number decoder. Old Norse skrjpt 'penance, confession'), but elsewhere in Germanic is used in senses 'writing, scripture, alphabet letter;' see. Short shrift originally was the brief time for a condemned criminal to confess before execution (1590s); figurative extension to 'little or no consideration' is first attested 1814.