screen, v.

c1632   Poem in Athenæum 27 Jan. (1883) 121/2   From whose inward light The Angells with their wings must skreene their sight.

1671   Milton Paradise Regain'd iv. 30   Back'd with a ridge of hills That screen'd the fruits of the earth and seats of men From cold Septentrion blasts.  

1728   E. Chambers Cycl. at Eye,   To screen his Eye, he will presently cover it therewith.

1785   W. Cowper Task iii. 440   He therefore timely warn'd himself supplies Her want of care, screening and keeping warm The plenteous bloom.

1823   W. Scoresby Jrnl. Voy. Northern Whale-fishery 201   The adjoining mountains..skreened the ice near their bases, from the solar rays.

1879   Geikie Geol. in Encycl. Brit. X. 268/2   Being hard, they resist the action of the falling drops and screen the earth below them.

1700   Dryden tr. Boccaccio Sigismonda & Guiscardo in Fables 131   The Curtains closely drawn, the Light to skreen.

1871   J. Tyndall Fragm. Sci. xiii. 384   You will perhaps try whether the magnetic power is not to be screened off.

1922   Wireless World 1 July 416/1   The problem is to screen the receiving apparatus from the effects induced directly by the oscillator.

1931   B.B.C. Year-bk. 1932 422   It will..be advisable to screen the coils L₁, L₂, the tuning condenser K₁, and the secondary circuit, L₃, K₂.

1950   Engineering 3 Feb. 140/2   On wireless-carrying vehicles electrical equipment must be screened.

1960   Pract. Wireless 36 393/1   The lead from the input socket is screened.

1971   L. T. Agger Introd. Electr. viii. 119   It is sometimes necessary..to screen a space from external electrostatic influence, as in protection against lightning of buildings containing explosives.

1686   J. Goad Astro-meteorologica ii. iv. 196   Clouds..shall skreen the Sun from us.

1712   Swift Jrnl. to Stella 6 Jan. (1948) II. 456   When he came out, Mr. secretary..walked so near him, that he quite screened him from me with his great periwig.

1785   W. Cowper Task i. 168   Our fav'rite elms, That screen the herdsman's solitary hut.

1817   Scott Rob Roy II. xii. 244   A small hedge, which imperfectly screened the alley in which I was walking.

1848   H. H. Wilson Hist. Brit. India 1805–1835 III. vii. 357   The Coorgs effectually screened themselves behind the bushes.

1893   Hansard's Parl. Deb. 4th Ser. 30 Mar. 1500   To send vessels to sea whose lights are screened on different principles.

1881   Bell tr. C. von Schmidt Instr. Training Cavalry 173   In all these different cases the leading thought..must..be to see without being seen, reconnoitre and screen.

1884   Trench Cavalry in Mod. War 270   The duties to be performed by the division—i.e...to screen the movements of one's own army, to unmask those of the enemy [etc.].

1899   Westm. Gaz. 11 Dec. 1/3   The duty of reconnoitring the foe and screening the friend.

1670   C. Cotton tr. G. Girard Hist. Life Duke of Espernon i. iv. 151   The artifice of his Enemies so skreen'd his merits from his Majesties observation, that he receiv'd very little thanks for his labour.

1692   R. Bentley Boyle Lect. i. 6   There are some Infidels among us, that..to avoid the odious name of Atheists, would shelter and skreen themselves under a new one of Deists.

1813   Shelley Queen Mab v. 60   Compelled, by its deformity, to screen With flimsy veil of justice and of right, Its unattractive lineaments.

1915   H. A. Colwell & S. Russ Radium, X-rays & Living Cell vi. 160   If the radium applicator is screened by the interposition of ·5 mm. of lead..the results are different.

1931   G. E. Birkett Radium Therapy ii. 36   The radium in solution should be heavily screened to protect people working in adjacent rooms.

1946   Ann. Reg. 1945 354   The pile was not screened well enough to protect the personnel from the injurious effects of the intense radiation emitted by the unstable fission products.

1922   P. D. Haughton How to watch & understand Football 7   To stop the runner who is so thoroughly screened by interferers.

1951   Sun (Baltimore) 24 Dec. (B ed.) 13/2   Watch when they screen for a shooter [in Basketball].

1961   J. S. Salak Dict. Amer. Sports 383   Screen (basketball), term used to describe a maneuver of the offensive team in which one player, by moving in front of opponent, ‘screens’ or ‘screens out’ that opponent from his teammate. A screen generally is worked in an effort to free one of the offensive team members for a shot at the basket.

c1485   in T. Stapleton Plumpton Corr. (1839) 58   If I shold therfore screane myself, & my frynds also, & not put me therfore to hurt.

1633   Bp. J. Hall Occas. Medit. (ed. 3) §cxii,   But how happy am I, if the interposition of my Saviour..may screene mee from the deserved wrath of..God.

1693   J. Locke Some Thoughts conc. Educ.§214 (1699) 376   He that Travels with them is to skreen them; get them out when they have run themselves into the Briars [etc.].

1738   Gentleman's Mag. Mar. 141/2   Were there any Hopes that he could ever be brought to skreen the most notorious Corruption, I dare say he would meet with the Approbation of this virtuous Society.

1780   New Newgate Cal. V. 206   All his artifices could not screen him from the justice of his country.

1817   J. Mill Hist. Brit. India II. v. ix. 696   Mr. Hastings had taken presents, and skreened himself by giving them up at last to the Company.

1824   W. Irving Tales of Traveller II. 244   Great exertions were made to screen him from justice, but in vain.

1850   R. Browning Easter Day ix,   No misery could screen The holders of the pearl of price From Caesar's envy.

1894   J. D. Astley Fifty Years of my Life II. 4,   I more than once helped—or at any rate screened—a man who had taken a drop too much.

1655   tr. C. Sorel Comical Hist. Francion v. 11,   I..took no care to approach to his assistance, being unwilling to skreen betwixt him and the abuse.

1664   J. Evelyn Kalendarium Hortense 67 in Sylva   Mixing it [sc. earth] with..very mellow Soil screen'd and prepar'd some time before.

1700   Moxon's Mech. Exercises: Bricklayers-wks. 15   A Skreen..with which one Man will Skreen as much Lime..as two Men can with a Sieve.

1763   Museum Rusticum (ed. 2) I. 79   If it is necessary to screen all the corn at this time, a small screen is fixed under the aperture of the second floor.

1815   J. Smith Panorama Sci. & Art I. 191   Sea-coal ashes, sifted or skreened through a sieve or skreen half an inch wide.

1847   Act 10 & 11 Vict. c. 89 §28   Every Person who..slacks, sifts or screens any Lime.

1901   Daily Chron. 11 July 7/6   Screening water through fine gauze was sometimes substituted for filtration.

1657   T. Reeve God's Plea for Nineveh 249   How ought we to skreen and riddle our soules concerning the steyn of blood-shed.

1943   Sun (Baltimore) 14 May 1/3   These offices ‘screen’ a list of prospects for the employers.

1945   Manch. Guardian 18 July 8/1   The recruits had come forward from the disbanded Guardia del Popolo and from most various sources and all would be screened carefully.

1949   Cancer Res. IX. 625/1   More than 1,000 chemical agents have been screened against Sarcoma 37 in vivo.

1956   W. Graham Sleeping Partner x. 82   When you said you were bringing an assistant to Harwell, of course we had to have her screened.

1958   Listener 19 June 1015/2,   I am within a few yards of the Customs desk... My wife had packed all the declared trinkets in one bag, and that is all he wants to see. He screens it in fifteen seconds flat.

1962   Sunday Times 14 Jan. 1/7   Every flight arriving from Europe was screened by medical and immigration officials for Pakistani immigrants.

1970   New Scientist 11 June 538/2   Drug companies are trying to weed out drug-takers from their staffs and to screen applicants so as to avoid taking on more.

1971   Daily Tel. 19 Apr. 15/7   Electronic equipment at airports to ‘screen’ passengers for weapons and so on.

1974   M. C. Gerald Pharmacol. iv. 77   Of the 15,000 compounds our government screened as substitute antimalarials, only two..were found to be superior to quinine.

1979   Daily Tel. 21 May 12/7   Mr Corliss describes only those events which were reported in reputable scientific journals, where all material is rigorously screened, and ‘mis-identifications and hoaxes are kept to a minimum’.

1943   Sun (Baltimore) 10 Dec. 6/7   The Attorney General said he believed it was possible to screen loyal from disloyal Japanese.

1976   National Observer (U.S.) 5 June 8/3   The experiment involves 20 communities, screened from an original list of 250 where some citizen efforts at decision-making already have cropped up.

1944 [implied in: Sun (Baltimore) 8 Jan. 1/1   The preliminary screening physical examination will be discontinued, except for individuals with obvious physical defects. (at screening n. 2c)].

1950   Amer. Jrnl. Public Health 40 275/1   A population group in one city is screened for tuberculosis. A separate program is conducted..to screen a population group for diabetes.

1970   Observer 12 Apr. 25/5   We could therefore soon be in a position to screen the whole population to see which recessive genes they carry.

1970   Daily Tel. 10 Oct. 8/4   Mass radiography is the easiest way for the man in the street to be screened.

1956   A. H. Compton Atomic Quest 27   The committee had begun to function that soon afterwards was screening physics news for items of possible military importance.

1964   Ann. N.Y. Acad. Sci. 115 569   The system proposed..allows the raw experimental data to be screened and digested directly by a small fast hybrid computer.

1977   Jrnl. Royal Soc. Arts 125 228/2   For the genetic resources material to be of any value to the breeder it must be evaluated or ‘screened’.

1943   Sun (Baltimore) 3 Aug. 11/1   The stalks are put through a mechanical disintegrator which reduces them to a juicy puree and screens out the toughest fibers.

1946   Cancer Res. VI. 490/1   In resorting to histologic and cytologic studies to screen out the inactive compounds we have made the assumption that damage induced by active compounds would become evident within 48 hours after injection.

1955   Publ. Amer. Dial. Soc. xxiv. 51   There is an increasing tendency to screen out all argot and slang in the presence of outsiders.

1967   J. M. Argyle Psychol. Interpersonal Behaviour x. 195   The method..releases extremely powerful emotional forces, and those not able to profit from them should be screened out.

1968   International Herald Tribune 3 Sept. 7/3   The FBI has improved its methods of screening out inaccurate reporting.

1971   Sci. Amer. Oct. 42/3   The detector was located underground to screen out relatively low-energy particles produced in the atmosphere.

1975   New Yorker 21 Apr. 54/2   The company's instructions to its managers do seem to indicate an employment policy favoring people of conventional outlook and screening out people who might harbor tendencies towards nonconformist intellectualizing.

1979   Bull. Amer. Acad. Arts & Sci. Feb. 17   The committee will not screen out applications.