peck

• IPA^(key): /pɛk/
• Rhymes: -ɛk

• Audio (Southern England)

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

peck (third-person singular simple present pecks, present participle pecking, simple past and past participle pecked)

1. (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. 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."

2. (transitive) To form by striking with the beak or a pointed instrument.

   to peck a hole in a tree

3. To strike, pick, thrust against, or dig into, with a pointed instrument, especially with repeated quick movements.
4. 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.

5. To do something in small, intermittent pieces.

   He has been pecking away at that project for some time now.

6. To type by searching for each key individually.
7. (rare) To type in general.
8. 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.

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

peck (plural pecks)

1. An act of striking with a beak.
2. A small kiss.

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

peck (plural pecks)

1. One quarter of a bushel; a dry measure of eight quarts.

   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.

2. 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

Variant of pick (“to throw”).

peck (third-person singular simple present pecks, present participle pecking, simple past and past participle pecked)

1. (regional) To throw.
2. 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.

peck (uncountable)

1. Discoloration caused by fungus growth or insects.

   an occurrence of peck in rice

• pecky

peck (uncountable)

1. (UK, slang, obsolete) Food.
   • 1821, W. T. Moncrieff, Tom and Jerry:

     Gemmen, have you ordered the peck and booze for the evening?

• John Camden Hotten (1873) The Slang Dictionary

peck

1. Misspelling of pec.