pech

From Middle High German pech, bech, from Old High German peh, beh, from Proto-West Germanic *pik (“pitch, tar, wood resin”). The form is unusual as it shows unshifted p-, but shifted -ch, even though the shift of initial p- to pf- occurred later than that of postvocalic -k to -ch. Theodor Frings therefore considered that the word was at first restricted to West Central German along the Rhine (which lacks the pf-shift) and only spread to Upper German slightly later when the shift was no longer ac