Adjacent Words

Flake definitions

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Webster's 1828 Dictionary

FLAKE, n. [L. floccus; Gr. Flake and flock are doubtless the same word, varied in orthography, and connected perhaps with L. plico, Gr. The sense is a complication, a crowd, or a lay.]
1. A small collection of snow, as it falls from the clouds or from the air; a little bunch or cluster of snowy crystals, such as fall in still moderate weather. This is a flake, lock or flock of snow.
2. A platform of hurdles, or small sticks made fast or interwoven, supported by stanchions, on which cod-fish is dried.
3. A layer or stratum; as a flake of flesh or tallow.
Job 41.
4. A collection or little particle of fire, or of combustible matter on fire, separated and flying off.
5. Any scaly matter in layers; any mass cleaving off in scales.
Little flakes of scurf.
6. A sort of carnations of two colors only, having large stripes going through the leaves.
White-flake, in painting, is lead corroded by means of the pressing of grapes, or a ceruse prepared by the acid of grapes. It is brought from Italy, and of a quality superior to common white lead. It is used in oil and varnished painting, when a clean white is required.
FLAKE, v.t. To form into flakes.
FLAKE, v.i. To break or separate in layers; to peel or scale off. We more usually say, to flake off.

WordNet (r) 3.0 (2005)

n
1: a crystal of snow [syn: snowflake, flake]
2: a person with an unusual or odd personality [syn: eccentric, eccentric person, flake, oddball, geek]
3: a small fragment of something broken off from the whole; "a bit of rock caught him in the eye" [syn: bit, chip, flake, fleck, scrap] v
1: form into flakes; "The substances started to flake"
2: cover with flakes or as if with flakes
3: come off in flakes or thin small pieces; "The paint in my house is peeling off" [syn: peel off, peel, flake off, flake]

Merriam Webster's

I. noun Etymology: Middle English; akin to Old English flacor flying (of arrows), Old Norse flakna to flake off, split Date: 14th century 1. a small loose mass or bit <flakes of snow> 2. a thin flattened piece or layer ; chip 3. slang cocaine 4. flake tool II. verb (flaked; flaking) Date: 1602 transitive verb 1. to cover with or as if with flakes 2. to form or break into flakes ; chip intransitive verb to separate into flakes; also to peel in flakes III. noun Etymology: Middle English flake, fleke hurdle; akin to Middle Dutch vl?ke, vlaec hurdle, Old Norse flaki Date: 1623 a stage, platform, or tray for drying fish or produce IV. noun Etymology: perhaps from flake out Date: 1964 a person who is flaky ; oddball

Oxford Reference Dictionary

1. n. & v. --n. 1 a a small thin light piece of snow. b a similar piece of another material. 2 a thin broad piece of material peeled or split off. 3 Archaeol. a piece of hard stone chipped off and used as a tool. 4 a natural division of the flesh of some fish. 5 the dogfish or other shark as food. --v.tr. & intr. (often foll. by away, off) 1 take off or come away in flakes. 2 sprinkle with or fall in snowlike flakes. Phrases and idioms: flake out colloq. fall asleep or drop from exhaustion; faint. Etymology: ME: orig. unkn.: cf. ON flakna flake off 2. n. 1 a stage for drying fish etc. 2 a rack for storing oatcakes etc. Etymology: ME, perh. f. ON flaki, fleki wicker shield

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Flake Flake, n. [Etym. uncertain; cf. 1st Fake.] A flat layer, or fake, of a coiled cable. Flake after flake ran out of the tubs, until we were compelled to hand the end of our line to the second mate. --F. T. Bullen.

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Flake Flake (fl[=a]k), n. [Cf. Icel. flaki, fleki, Dan. flage, D. vlaak.] 1. A paling; a hurdle. [prov. Eng.] 2. A platform of hurdles, or small sticks made fast or interwoven, supported by stanchions, for drying codfish and other things. You shall also, after they be ripe, neither suffer them to have straw nor fern under them, but lay them either upon some smooth table, boards, or flakes of wands, and they will last the longer. --English Husbandman. 3. (Naut.) A small stage hung over a vessel's side, for workmen to stand on in calking, etc.

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Flake Flake (fl[=a]k), n. [Cf. Icel. flakna to flake off, split, flagna to flake off, Sw. flaga flaw, flake, flake plate, Dan. flage snowflake. Cf. Flag a flat stone.] 1. A loose filmy mass or a thin chiplike layer of anything; a film; flock; lamina; layer; scale; as, a flake of snow, tallow, or fish. ``Lottle flakes of scurf.'' --Addison. Great flakes of ice encompassing our boat. --Evelyn. 2. A little particle of lighted or incandescent matter, darted from a fire; a flash. With flakes of ruddy fire. --Somerville. 3. (Bot.) A sort of carnation with only two colors in the flower, the petals having large stripes.

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Flake Flake, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Flaked; p. pr. & vb. n. Flaking.] To form into flakes. --Pope.

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Flake Flake, v. i. To separate in flakes; to peel or scale off.

Collin's Cobuild Dictionary

(flakes, flaking, flaked) 1. A flake is a small thin piece of something, especially one that has broken off a larger piece. Large flakes of snow began swiftly to fall. ...oat flakes. N-COUNT: usu with supp, oft N of n, n N 2. If something such as paint flakes, small thin pieces of it come off. They can see how its colours have faded and where paint has flaked. VERB: V • Flake off means the same as flake. The surface corrosion was worst where the paint had flaked off. PHRASAL VERB: V P

International Standard Bible Encyclopedia

flak (mappal, a word of uncertain meaning):

It is used in the sense of "refuse (husks) of the wheat" in Am 8:6. With regard to the body we find it used in Job 41:23 in the description of leviathan (the crocodile): "The flakes of his flesh are joined together: they are firm upon him; they cannot be moved." Baethgen in Kautzsch's translation of the Old Testament translates "Wampen," i.e. the collops or lateral folds of flesh and armored skin. A better translation would perhaps be: "the horny epidermic scales" of the body, differentiated from the bony dermal scutes of the back (Hebrew "channels of shields," "courses of scales"), which are mentioned in Job 41:15 margin.

H. L. E. Luering

Soule's Dictionary of English Synonyms

I. n. Scale, lamina, layer. II. v. n. Scale, scale off, come off in flakes.

Moby Thesaurus

aliene, arrange in layers, avalanche, band, bar, bedlamite, bespangle, bespeckle, bespot, bit, blizzard, blotch, borderline case, character, check, checker, chip, collapse, crackbrain, crackpot, crank, crystal, dandruff, dapple, delaminate, dement, demoniac, desquamate, dot, driven snow, eccentric, energumen, erratic, exfoliate, fanatic, flake off, fleck, floccule, flocculus, flock, flurry, fou, fragment, freak, freckle, granular snow, harlequin, idiot, igloo, iris, keel over, kook, lamina, laminate, lay down, lay up, layer, loon, loony, lunatic, maculate, madman, maniac, mantle of snow, marble, marbleize, meshuggenah, mogul, motley, mottle, noncompos, nonconformist, nut, oddball, paring, particle, pass out, pepper, phrenetic, piece, polychrome, polychromize, rainbow, raving lunatic, recluse, scale, scale off, scrap, screwball, scurf, shaving, sliver, slosh, slush, snow, snow banner, snow bed, snow blanket, snow blast, snow fence, snow flurry, snow roller, snow slush, snow squall, snow wreath, snow-crystal, snowball, snowbank, snowbridge, snowcap, snowdrift, snowfall, snowfield, snowflake, snowland, snowman, snowscape, snowshed, snowslide, snowslip, snowstorm, spangle, speck, speckle, splotch, spot, sprinkle, stigmatize, stipple, strange duck, stratify, streak, striate, stripe, stud, tattoo, tessellate, tuft, variegate, vein, wafer, weirdo, wet snow