BECK, or BEKE, a word which imports a small stream of water issuing from some rill or spring. Hence hill-becks, little brooks in the rough and wild mountains about Richmond near Lancashire, so called on account of their ghistliness and depth.
BECK is also used amongst us in the composition of names of places originally situated on rivulets; hence Walbeck, Bournbeck, &c. The Germans use beck in the same manner.