[f. KEEN v.2 + -ER1.] One who keens or laments; a professional mourner at Irish wakes and funerals who utters the keen.
1811. Busby, Dict. Mus. (ed. 3), Keeners, the name of the Irish Singing Mourners.
1845. Mrs. S. C. Hall, Whiteboy, vi. 55. The ban caointhe, or chief keener, had assumed her place beside the head of the bed.
1894. W. B. Yeats, Celtic Twilight, 101. As he drew near came to him the cry of the keeners.
