flake

Meaning

Noun

1. A loose filmy mass or a thin chiplike layer of anything
2. A scale of a fish or similar animal
3. A prehistoric tool chipped out of stone.
4. (informal) A person who is impractical, flighty, unreliable, or inconsistent; especially with maintaining a living.
5. A carnation with only two colours in the flower, the petals having large stripes.
6. A flat turn or tier of rope.
7. (US, slang) A corrupt arrest, e.g. to extort money for release or merely to fulfil a quota.
8. A wire rack for drying fish.

Verb

1. To break or chip off in a flake.
2. (colloquial) To prove unreliable or impractical; to abandon or desert, to fail to follow through.
3. To store an item such as rope or sail in layers
4. (Ireland, slang) To hit (another person).
5. (US, slang) To plant evidence to facilitate a corrupt arrest.
6. To lay out on a flake for drying.

Synonyms

chip

bit

slice

piece

fragment

fleck

scale

snowflake

❄️

peel

scrap

peel off

part

lump

flake off

chunk

drop

eccentric person

portion

small piece

exfoliate

peeling

lamella

oddball

layer

wafer

flock

skin

shell

🐚

eccentric

geek

fold

flurry

fluff

floe

dogfish

floc

desquamate

flaky

crumb

character

flaking

nurse

flakiness

crisp

pane of glass

pare

leaf

layered

film

📽️

covering

Translations

Flocke

copo

flocon

vlok

Splitter

scaglia

fiocco

🙇

fragment

éclat

λέπι

νιφάς

schilfer

Schuppe

νιφάδα

morceau

Pronounced as (IPA)

/fleɪk/

Etymology

Inherited from Middle English: flake

Inherited from Old English: flacca

Cognate with Old Norse: flakna

Cognate with Norwegian: flak

Cognate with Swedish: flak

Cognate with Danish: flage

Cognate with German: Flocke

Cognate with Dutch: vlak

Cognate with Latin: plaga

Cognate with Welsh: llech

In summary

From Middle English flake (“a flake of snow”), from Old English flacca and/or Old Norse flak (“loose or torn piece”) (compare Old Norse flakna (“to flake or chip”)), from Proto-Germanic *flaką (“something flat”), from Proto-Indo-European *pleh₂- (“flat, broad, plain”). Cognate with Norwegian flak (“slice, sliver”, literally “piece torn off”), Swedish flak (“a thin slice”), Danish flage (“flake”), German Flocke (“flake”), Dutch vlak (“smooth surface, plain”) and vlok (“flake”), as well as with Latin plaga (“flat surface, district, region”) and Welsh llech (“slate, tablet”). Doublet of plage.