Flake sb.²

Forms: 6–8 fleak(e, 9 dial. fleak, Sc. flaike, 4– flake. [Of difficult etymology: possibly several distinct words have coalesced, though ultimate derivation from the Aryan root plăg- (cf. Gr. [char.] to beat), parallel and synonymous with plăk- (cf. Lith. plakù I beat) may plausibly account for all the senses, and also for the fact that most of these resemble senses belonging to FLAW or FLAUGHT, or to related words in other Teut. langs. (f. Aryan root plak-). Sense 1 has not been found earlier than Chaucer, though Junius cites an OE. ‘flacea 7 flæðra, flaws or flakes of snow’; it appears to be cognate with ON. flóke flock of wool, lock of hair, and perh. with OHG. floccho of same meaning (if this be genuinely a Teut. word, repr. a pre-Teut. *pləgnén-, and not an adoption of L. floccus); the OE. flacor, fluttering, has also been compared. The Da. flage, sneflage, usually cited as equivalent to E. flake, perh. corresponds rather to FLAW (Da. g representing ON. g as well as ON. k); the Dansk Ordbog 1800 explains it as a large mass of falling snow, as opposed to flok which means a ‘flake’ in the Eng. sense. The senses expressing the notion of ‘something peeled or split off’ may be compared with FLAY v. (OTeut. *flah-:—OAryan *plak-). There is possibly a third primary sense, ‘something flat’; cf. OHG. flah adj. (mod.Ger. flach), Du. vlak flat, Sw. flaka plate, Norw. flak ice-floe. But the mutual relation of the Eng. senses is very uncertain.]

  1.  a. One of the small flocculent pieces in which snow falls.

c. 1384.  Chaucer, H. Fame, III. 101.

1589.  Pappe with an Hatchet, 2. If you meane to gather clowdes in the Commonwealth, to threaten tempests, for your flakes of snowe weele pay you with stones of hayle; if with an Easterlie winde you bring Catterpillers into the Church, with a Northerne wind weele driue barrennes into your wits.

1597–8.  Bp. Hall, Sat. I. vii.

a. 1649.  Drumm. Hawth., Poems, Wks. (1711), 5.

1784.  Cowper, Task, IV. 326.

1820.  Shelley, Sensitive Plant, I. 26.

  b.  A light fleecy tuft; a small piece of some light loosely-cohering substance, as down or fluff; a flock; a fleecy streak (of cloud).

1653.  H. More, Antid. Ath., II. vii. (1712), 61. All the Businesses of Men do very much depend upon these little long Fleaks or Threads of Hemp and Flax.

1665.  Hooke, Microgr., 202. Looking most like to a flake of Worsted prepar’d to be spun.

1712.  trans. Pomet’s Hist. Drugs, I. 153. In the Flake [orig. flocon], which is swell’d by the Heat to the Size of a Pullet’s Egg, there are seven Seeds as large as Lupins, sticking together, within it is white, oily, and of a good Taste.

1741.  Stack, in Phil. Trans., XLI. 600. The Wind blew at South-west by South, as appeared by some small Fleaks of Clouds coming from that Quarter.

1833.  Ht. Martineau, Manch. Strike, i. 14. You had rather see her covered with white cotton flakes than with yellow ribands; but remember it is no fault of mine that she is not still a piecer in yonder factory.

1855.  Kingsley, Heroes, I. (1868), 5. She looked up, and over her head were mighty cliffs, all red in the setting sun, and round her rocks and breakers, and flying flakes of foam.

1877.  Black, Green Past., xxxv. (1878), 278. There was not a flake of cloud in the sky.

  c.  ? Gossamer thread. rare^–1.

1817.  Kirby & Sp., Entomol., II. xxiii. 336. While they [spiders] fly in this manner, they pull in their long thread with their fore feet, so as to form it into a ball—or, as we may call it, air-balloon—of flake.

  2.  A portion of ignited matter thrown off by a burning or incandescent body; a detached portion of flame; † a flash (of lightning).

13[?].  E. E. Allit. P., B. 954. Of felle flaunkes of fyr & flakes of soufre.

1590.  Spenser, F. Q., III. ii. 5.

1601.  J. Weever, The Mirror of Martyrs, E viij b.

1602.  Marston, Antonio’s Rev., I. iii. Wks. 1856, I. 31.

1660.  Howell, Lexicon, Flakes that flee from hammered red hot iron.

1697.  Dryden, Virg. Georg., IV. 254.

1876.  Geo. Eliot, Dan. Der., I. 303. To speak or be spoken to about these new thoughts seemed like falling flakes of fire to his imagination.

1877.  Bryant, Poems, Voice of Autumn, i.

  3.  A minute exfoliated piece of something; a scale, flattish fragment; † a splinter (of wood). In the first quot. app. fig., a ‘bit,’ small portion.

c. 1500.  Bk. Maid Emlyn, 109, in Hazl., E. P. P., IV. 86.

1533.  More, Apol., i. Wks. 845/1. Sifted to y^e vttermost flake of branne.

1599.  T. M[oufet], Silkwormes, 69.

a. 1648.  K. Digby, in Closet Open, in The Leisure Hour XXXIII. (1884), 377/1. ‘Cock Ale’: Take eight gallons of Ale, take a Cock and boil him well; then take four pounds of Raisins of the Sun well stoned, two or three Nutmegs, three or four flakes of Mace, half a pound of Dates; beat them all in a Mortar, and put to them two quarts of the best Sack; and when the Ale hath done working, put these in, and stop it close six or seven days, and then bottle it, and a month after you may drink it.

1676.  Grew, Anat. Plants (1682), 263. The Size of most of them was near that of the Flakes or Grains of Bay-Salt.

1705.  Addison, Italy, 370. At the same time are seen little Flakes of Scurf rising up, that are probably the Parts which compose the Islands, for they often mount of themselves, tho’ the Water is not troubled.

c. 1720.  W. Gibson, Farrier’s Guide, II. lxxxix. (1738), 252. All such Effects may be produc’d by a Prick of a Nail, a Stub, or a Fleak, when it sticks in those tender sensible Parts.

1799.  G. Smith, Laboratory, I. 21. Upon that, fine iron flakes, in order to sink it.

  4.  A thin broad piece peeled or split off from the surface of something. In recent use also spec. a chip of hard stone used in prehistoric times as a cutting instrument; cf. FLINT-FLAKE.

1591.  G. Fletcher, Russe Commw. (Hakluyt Soc.), 14. This [a soft rock] they cut into pieces, and so tear it into thin flakes, which naturally it is apt for, and so use it for glasse-lanthorns and such like.

1601.  Holland, Pliny, II. 467. The flint or rock … will cleaue in length, and come away by the sides in broad flakes.

1607.  Topsell, Serpents (1658), 675. A thin fleak of a horn, which being laid over black, seemeth black.

1703.  Moxon, Mech. Exerc., 218. The Beam and Tooth … cut and tore away great Flakes of the Mettal, till it receiv’d the whole and perfect Form the Tooth would make.

1845.  Darwin, Voy. Nat., xvi. (1852), 369. The shells, higher up on this terrace, could be traced scaling off in flakes, and falling into an impalpable powder.

1865.  Lubbock, Preh. Times, i. (1878), 13. We have a list comprising … 310 long flakes, and about 2000 small ones.

1875.  Lyell, Princ. Geol., II. III. xlvii. 367. Flint flakes having a fine cutting edge, evidently chipped off by the hand of man, are met with not only in the old drift, but in formations of the Neolithic and Bronze ages, for they afford the finest cutting edge that was obtainable before the invention of steel.

  b.  A piece of skin or flesh peeled or torn off; † a torn strip (of a garment).

1611.  Sylvester, Du Bartas, II. iv. III. Schisme, 236.

1802.  Med. Jrnl., VIII. 30. The skin, instead of becoming branny, separated in large flakes.

1877.  Bryant, Odyss., V. 520.

1894.  Daily News, 26 June, 8/2. The flesh hung in flakes … on his arm.

  5.  A stratum, lamina, or layer. (In quot. 1616 applied to the shell of an oyster.)

1577.  B. Googe, Heresbach’s Husb. (1586), I. 21 b. Eyther the hardnesse of the Earth resisteth the Plowe, or yf it doo enter, it breakes it not small yenough, but turneth vp great flakes, hurtful to the next plowing.

1613.  Purchas, Pilgrimage, VI. v. § 2 (1626), 649. The Egyptian paper (of which ours made of rags hath still the name) was made of a Sedgie Reed, growing in the marishes of Egypt, called Papyrus, which easily diuides it selfe into thinne flakes.

1616.  Browne, Brit. Past., II. iii. 56.

1828.  Stark, Elem. Nat. Hist., II. 485. These are, massive—disseminated—in angular pieces—in grains—in plates—and in flakes or thin laminæ.

1843.  Portlock, Geol., 543. These fissures are coated by a dark green, talcose, clayey matter, disposed in irregular flakes, and on exposure, become coated with oxide of iron.

1882.  Garden, XXI. 14 Jan., 27/3. Even the common Arabis and Aubrietias, Thymes and Veronicas grow over stones in great flakes when let alone, and form for themselves a soil in which to flourish and bloom much more exquisitely than on the flat surface.

  b.  pl. (See quot.)

1883.  Gresley, Gloss. Coal Mining, Flaikes, shaly or fissile sandstone.

  6.  A (loose) sheet of ice; a floe.

1555.  Eden, Decades (Arb.), 331. The flakes or pieses of Ise caryed into the sea by force of the ryuers, doo flote aboue the water in maner all the hole yeare.

1685.  Luttrell, Brief Rel. (1857), I. 297–8. Vast flakes of ice of severall miles were seen floating in the sea.

1796.  Morse, Amer. Geog., I. 139. The only practicable method of reaching that part of the country, will be to coast north-about in small vessels, between the great flakes of ice and the shore.

1820.  W. Scoresby, Acc. Arct. Reg., I. 243. One of the ships … accidentally fell in with some immense flakes of ice, which, on his return to his companions, he described as being truly wonderful, and as resembling fields in the extent of their surface.

  7.  pl. The portions into which the flesh, esp. of certain fish, naturally falls.

1611.  Bible, Job xli. 23. The flakes of his flesh are ioyned together: they are firme in themselues, they cannot be moued.

1622.  Drayton, Poly-olb., xxvi. (1748), 371.

1698.  Tyson, Opossum, in Phil. Trans., XX. 139. Regular large Laminæ [of fat], which were easily separable from one another, in broad Fleaks.

1892.  H. G. Hutchinson, Fairway Island, 19. The salmon … was insipid … though Mr. Trewin … showed the curd between its flakes.

  8.  A bundle of parallel threads or fibres; a lock or band of hair not twisted or plaited, arch.

1592.  Lyly, Midas, III. ii. Your mustachoes sharpe at the ends, like showmakers aules, or hanging downe to your mouth like goates flakes?

1697.  Dampier, Voy., I. 37. Maho … whose Bark is made up of strings or threads, very strong. You may draw it off either in flakes or small threads.

1713.  Steele, Guardian, No. 86, 19 June, ¶ 5. The flakes of hair which naturally suggest the idea of lightning.

1792.  Dibdin, Hannah Hewit; or, The Female Crusoe, in Naval Chron. (1810), XXIV. 464. I dressed some fine cotton into as thin flakes as possible, by means of the prickly pear leaf, which is formed exactly like an instrument for carding.

1839.  Marryat, Phantom Ship, I. viii. 164. His hair was flaxen, and fell in long flakes upon his shoulders, his complexion fair, and his eyes of a soft blue: although there was little of the sailor in his appearance, few knew or did their duty better.

1870.  Swinburne, Ess. & Stud. (1875), 363. Divine the massive weight of carven curls bound up behind, the heavy straying flakes of unfilleted hair below.

  transf.  1658.  Rowland, Moufet’s Theat. Ins., 908. That Honey is best for substance, which … if you lift it up a good height on the top of you finger, it falls to the earth still homogeneous, unsevered, no way parted asunder, but remaines in one continued flake or line.

  9.  A kind of carnation with striped petals.

1727.  Bradley, Fam. Dict., s.v. Carnation, The Flakes are of two Colours only, and those always strip’d.

1822.  Loudon, Encycl. Gardening, III. II. 977. The varieties of this flower [carnation] are now arranged in three classes: flakes, bizarres, and picotées.

  10.  [from the vb.] A small fracture or ‘chip.’

1866–7.  G. Stephens, Runic Monuments, I. 205. A small blow or hollow is visible at the right of the top of the second letter, but a mere accidental flake, and not touching the letter itself.

  11.  a. attrib. in the trade names for varieties of certain products, as flake-manna, -tapioca, -tobacco, from their flaky appearance.

1886.  Daily News, 24 Dec., 2/6. Tapioca … Singapore flake sold at rather firmer prices.

18B9.  Syd. Soc. Lex., s.v. Manna, Flake Manna, a term employed in English commerce to denote the larger fragments and better qualities of manna.

1894.  Westm. Gaz., 14 Feb., 2/1. Flake tobaccos … are growing … in popularity.

  b.  Comb., as flake-heaped ppl. a.; also flake-feather, a plumule of extreme fineness and silky texture, found in falconine birds; hence flake-feathered adj. (in quot. transf.); flake-knife (see sense 4); flake-stand, the cooling-tub of a still-worm; flake-white, a pigment made from the purest white-lead in the form of flakes or scales.

1837.  Macgillivray, Hist. Brit. Birds, I. Introduction, 79. If it be necessary to give these feathers a name, they may be called *flake-feathers.

1848.  D. Greenwell, Poems, 35.

1880.  Browning, Dram. Idylls, Ser. II. Pan & Luna, 38.

1865.  E. B. Tylor, Researches into the Early History of Mankind, viii. 195. The *flake knives are very rude, but they are like what are found elsewhere, and there is no break in the series which ends in the beautiful specimens from Mexico and Scandinavia.

1830.  M. Donovan, Dom. Econ., I. 255. The body of this still cost one pound; its head about four shillings; the worm cost twenty-five shillings; the mash-tun and *flakestand might both be worth twelve shillings.

1660.  Albert Durer Revived, 18. While Lead, or *Flake White.

1752.  Lady Luxborough, Lett. to Shenstone, 6 Nov. My great Parlour looks very handsome now it is painted with flake-white.

1883.  J. Payn, Thicker than Water, xxix. (1884), 229. Her whole face with a pallor on it like flake-white on dead-white.