flask

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   A small flat bottle for carrying a drink, often kept in a pocket.

   He kept a flask of coffee in his coat for the cold mornings.

2. 2
   noun

   A glass container with a narrow neck and wide base, used in a laboratory.

   The chemist heated the liquid in a glass flask over the flame.

From Middle English flask, flaske (“case, cask, keg”), from Old English flasce, flaxe (“bottle, flask”) and Medieval Latin flascō (“bottle”); from Frankish *flaskā; both from Proto-Germanic *flaskǭ (“braid-covered bottle, wicker-enclosed jug”), from Proto-Indo-European *ploḱ-skō (“flat”), or from Proto-Indo-European *pleḱ- (“to weave”). Doublet of fiasco, flacon, and flagon. Related to Dutch fles; also German Low German Flaske, Fless, German Flasche, Danish flaske; also Lithuanian plókščias, Czech ploský, Albanian flashkët. The sense “laboratory glassware” is from Italian fiasco, and the sense…

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