peck
/pɛk/ verb, noun, proper noun
Forms pecks pecking pecked
- verb (ambitransitive) To strike or pierce with the beak or bill (of a bird). “The birds pecked at their food.”
- verb (transitive) To form by striking with the beak or a pointed instrument. “to peck a hole in a tree”
- verb To strike, pick, thrust against, or dig into, with a pointed instrument, especially with repeated quick movements.
- verb To seize and pick up with the beak, or as if with the beak; to bite; to eat; often with up.
- verb To do something in small, intermittent pieces. “He has been pecking away at that project for some time now.”
- verb To type by searching for each key individually.
- verb (rare) To type in general.
- verb To kiss briefly.
- noun An act of striking with a beak.
- noun A small kiss.
- noun 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. “Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers.”
- noun Similar units in other systems of measure, such as the Roman modius or Chinese dou.
- noun A great deal; a large or excessive quantity. “She figured most children probably ate a peck of dirt before they turned ten.”
- verb (regional) To throw.
- verb To lurch forward; especially, of a horse, to stumble after hitting the ground with the toe instead of the flat of the foot.
- noun Discoloration caused by fungus growth or insects.
- noun (UK, slang, obsolete) Food.
- proper noun A surname.
- proper noun A city in Idaho.
- proper noun An unincorporated community in Sedgwick County and Sumner County, Kansas.
Synonyms
fling hurl bung cast chuck chunk cook dash dump feck jerk heave hield hoy huck hurtle launch lob peg pick batch deal flock good deal great deal hatful heap lot mass mess
Etymology
From Middle English pecken, pekken, variant of Middle English piken, picken, pikken (“to pick, use a pointed implement”). More at pick.
Probably from Anglo-Norman pek, pekke, of uncertain origin.
Variant of pick (“to throw”).
* As an English surname, variant of Speake with loss of the initial letter.
* Also as an English (and sometimes Irish) surname, variant of Peak, Petch, Peach.
* As a south German surname, variant of Beck. Compare Pek, also found in Poland.
* As a Dutch and north German surname, from pek (“pitch, tar, resin”).
* As a Hungarian, Czech, Polish, Serbo-Croatian and Slovene surname, Americanized and Germanized from Pek, Pék meaning "baker," itself ultimately from the German verb backen.
Webster’s 1913
- noun The fourth part of a bushel; a dry measure of eight quarts; as, a peck of wheat. "A peck of provender." Shak.
- noun A great deal; a large or excessive quantity. "A peck of uncertainties and doubts." Milton.
- verb To strike with the beak; to thrust the beak into; as, a bird pecks a tree.
- verb Hence: To strike, pick, thrust against, or dig into, with a pointed instrument; especially, to strike, pick, etc., with repeated quick movements.
Etymology [Perh. akin to pack; or, orig., an indefinite quantity, and fr. peck, v. (below): cf. also F. picotin a peak.]
Etymology [See Pick, v.]
Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “peck”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details