flake

CEFRB2

/fleɪk/

noun

Türkçe translations

Translating…

In plain English

  1. 01

    noun

    A small, thin piece that breaks off something.

  2. 02

    noun

    Extra detail

    A prehistoric tool chipped out of stone.

Examples

  • If you sift through barrels of dirt, you may eventually find a flake of gold.

  • It's a flake covered in chocolate!

At a glance

Sits at B2 on the CEFR scale

Senses
5
Parts of speech
1
Citations
5
Synonyms
1

Deep Dive

noun

Extra meanings

  1. A scale of a fish or similar animal

  2. A loose filmy mass or a thin chiplike layer of anything

  3. A carnation with only two colours in the flower, the petals having large stripes.

More examples

In context

  • She makes pleasant conversation, but she's kind of a flake when it comes time for action.

  • There were a few flakes of paint on the floor from when we were painting the walls.

  • flakes of dandruff

Synonyms

Quick test

Two questions on this entry. Nothing is scored.

Question 1 · Quick check

A tiny blank of paint chipped off the old wall, revealing the brick underneath.

Practise this properly in the app, where the word comes back before you forget it.

Nearby

Origin

noun

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.