Past tense of peck: to strike or jab something quickly with a beak, or to kiss someone quickly and lightly.
From Old English 'peccere' or related Germanic roots imitating the sharp sound and motion of a bird's beak striking something. The extended meaning of a quick kiss emerged because the action resembles a bird's quick striking motion.
Birds peck 20-30 times per second when drumming on wood or eating, and their skulls have special shock-absorbing tissue that we didn't fully understand until the 2000s—which is wild because people have been watching birds peck for thousands of years but only recently figured out the engineering.
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