fifth base
- noun
- /fɪfθ beɪs/
- Offensive
:
echar un polvo (informal, vulgar)
- After months together, the couple decided they were ready for fifth base.
Examples
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After their romantic dinner, they ended up at fifth base.
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Some people debate what exactly counts as fifth base in a relationship.
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They laughed about how fifth base was never even discussed in high school.
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They finally reached fifth base after months of dating.
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After months of dating, they felt comfortable enough to move to fifth base.
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In their conversation, they joked about the awkward moments leading up to fifth base.
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Many teens wonder when they will finally reach fifth base in their relationships.
How Intimate
- Offensive
- Offensive
50
6.0
- NSFW
34
7.1
- NSFW
130
8.1
- NSFW
100
1.0
1
1.9
Surface Forms
Morphology
The phrase literally combines 'fifth' (an ordinal) and 'base' (a baseball station), which signals a staged progression and therefore gives a partial clue that it denotes a further 'stage' beyond the known four bases. However, the specific meaning—an advanced stage of sexual activity—is slangic, culturally rooted in the baseball-as-dating-metaphor mapping, and not derivable from the literal words by a B1 learner without exposure, making it only partially transparent.
Etymology
Fifth base comes from baseball. In the game players run from base to base, and people used each 'base' as a way to talk about steps of closeness in dating. So one popular story says a joking fifth base means 'having sex'.