Brakować piątej klepki
Listen
What it means
Literally “to be missing the fifth stave.” Means to have a screw loose — to be a bit crazy, not quite right in the head. Used humorously about someone acting strangely or irrationally.
Vocabulary
- brakować — to be missing / to lack
- piąta — fifth
- klepka — stave (a plank of a barrel)
Grammar note
'Brakować' takes the genitive — 'piątej klepki' is genitive, meaning the fifth stave is what's missing.
Cultural context
The image is of a barrel missing one of its wooden staves — it can't hold anything together. A barrel needs all its staves to function.
Intermediate
Noticed a typo, a wrong translation, or anything that doesn't look right? We'd love to fix it — just let us know via the contact page. Thank you!
More Polish idioms
- Literally "one's whole life flew past before the eyes," this phrase describes the vivid, involuntary …
- Literally "for an example," na przykład is the standard Polish phrase for "for example" or "for …
- Literally "in the last/recent times," ostatnimi czasy is a common temporal phrase meaning "lately," …
- Literally "in the manner of Judas," this adverb describes acting in a treacherous, backstabbing way …