# peck
## English
### Pronunciation

* IPA: /pɛk/
* Rhymes: -ɛk
* Audio (Southern England):(file)

### Etymology 1

From Middle English pecken, pekken, variant of Middle English piken, picken, pikken (“to pick, use a pointed implement”). More at pick.

#### Verb

peck (third-person singular simple present pecks, present participle pecking, simple past and past participle pecked)
* (transitive, intransitive) To strike or pierce with the beak or bill (of a bird).
    The birds pecked at their food.
** 1922 October 26, Virginia Woolf, chapter 2, in Jacob’s Room, Richmond, London: […] Leonard & Virginia Woolf at the Hogarth Press, →OCLC; republished London: The Hogarth Press, 1960, →OCLC:The rooster had been known to fly on her shoulder and peck her neck, so that now she carried a stick or took one of the children with her when she went to feed the fowls.
** 1900 May 17, L[yman] Frank Baum, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, Chicago, Ill.; New York, N.Y.: Geo[rge] M[elvin] Hill Co., →OCLC:And the Wicked Witch said to the King Crow, "Fly at once to the strangers; peck out their eyes and tear them to pieces."
* (transitive) To form by striking with the beak or a pointed instrument.
    to peck a hole in a tree
* To strike, pick, thrust against, or dig into, with a pointed instrument, especially with repeated quick movements.
* To seize and pick up with the beak, or as if with the beak; to bite; to eat; often with up.
** c. 1595–1596 (date written), William Shakespeare, “Loues Labour’s Lost”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene ii]:This fellow pecks up wit as pigeons peas.
** 1713 September 14, letter to Joseph Addison, The Guardian, issue 160.
    I HAVE laid a wager, with a friend of mine, about the pigeons that used to peck up the corn which belonged to the ants.
* To do something in small, intermittent pieces.
    He has been pecking away at that project for some time now.
* To type by searching for each key individually.
* (rare) To type in general.
* To kiss briefly.
** 1997 June 26, J. K. Rowling [pseudonym; Joanne Rowling], chapter 1, in Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone (Harry Potter; 1), London: Bloomsbury Publishing, →ISBN:At half past eight, Mr. Dursley picked up his briefcase, pecked Mrs. Dursley on the cheek, and tried to kiss Dudley good-bye but missed, because Dudley was now having a tantrum and throwing his cereal at the walls.

##### Derived terms

* henpeck
* hunt and peck
* peck at
* pecking order
* peckish
* woodpecker

##### Translations
#### Noun

peck (plural pecks)
* An act of striking with a beak.
* A small kiss.

##### Translations
### Etymology 2

Probably from Anglo-Norman pek, pekke, of uncertain origin.

#### Noun

peck (plural pecks)
* One quarter of a bushel; a dry measure of eight quarts; equal to approximately 9092 cubic centimeters in the imperial system or 8810 cubic centimeters in the U.S. system.
    They picked a peck of wheat.
** 1851, Henry Mayhew, “Gross Value of the Fruit and Vegetables Sold Annually in the London Streets”, in London Labour and the London Poor:22,110 bushels of French beans, at 6d. per peck, or 2s. per bushel
** 1851, Henry Mayhew, “Of the Experience of a Fried Fish-seller, and of the Class of Customers”, in London Labour and the London Poor:I took his advice, and went to Billingsgate for the first time in my life, and bought a peck of oysters for 2s. 6d.
* A great deal; a large or excessive quantity.
    She figured most children probably ate a peck of dirt before they turned ten.
** 1644, J[ohn] M[ilton], The Doctrine or Discipline of Divorce: […], 2nd edition, London: [s.n.], →OCLC, book:a peck of uncertainties and doubts

##### Translations
### Etymology 3

Variant of pick (“to throw”).

#### Verb

peck (third-person singular simple present pecks, present participle pecking, simple past and past participle pecked)
* (regional) To throw.
    Synonyms: fling, hurl; see also Thesaurus:throw
* To lurch forward; especially, of a horse, to stumble after hitting the ground with the toe instead of the flat of the foot.
** 1928, Siegfried Sassoon, Memoirs of a Fox-Hunting Man, Penguin, published 2013, page 97:Anyhow, one of them fell, another one pecked badly, and Jerry disengaged himself from the group to scuttle up the short strip of meadow to win by a length.

### Etymology 4
#### Noun

peck (uncountable)
* Discoloration caused by fungus growth or insects.
    an occurrence of peck in rice

##### Derived terms

* pecky

### Etymology 5
#### Noun

peck (uncountable)
* (UK, slang, obsolete) Food.
** 1821, W. T. Moncrieff, Tom and Jerry:Gemmen, have you ordered the peck and booze for the evening?

##### References

* John Camden Hotten (1873) The Slang Dictionary

### Etymology 6
#### Noun

peck
* Misspelling of pec.