means Keening is a loud, wailing lament for the dead, traditionally sung or cried aloud as part of mourning.

from From the Irish word caoineadh, meaning 'to lament,' which gave English the verb 'keen.' In Ireland and Scotland, keening was a real practice: women — sometimes hired as professional mourners — would cry out over the body in a high, rhythmic wail. The word arrived in English by the 19th century carrying that Gaelic grief intact, the same root that names the Irish caoineadh tradition of lament.