salt

From Middle English salt, from Old English sealt, from Proto-Germanic *saltą (compare Dutch zout, German Salz, Norwegian Bokmål salt and Swedish salt), from Proto-Indo-European *seh₂l- (compare Welsh halen, Old Irish salann, Latin sal, Russian соль (solʹ), Ancient Greek ἅλς (háls), Albanian ngjelmë (“salty, savory”), Old Armenian աղ (ał), Tocharian A sāle, Sanskrit सलिल (salila)).

• (UK) IPA^(key): /sɔːlt/, /sɒlt/
• (US) IPA^(key): /sɔlt/, /sɑlt/
• (General New Zealand) IPA^(key): /sɒɯt/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• Audio (UK)

  (file)

• Audio

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɒlt

salt crystals

salt (countable and uncountable, plural salts)

1. A common substance, chemically consisting mainly of sodium chloride (NaCl), used extensively as a condiment and preservative.
   • c. 1430 (reprinted 1888), Thomas Austin, ed., Two Fifteenth-century Cookery-books. Harleian ms. 279 (ab. 1430), & Harl. ms. 4016 (ab. 1450), with Extracts from Ashmole ms. 1429, Laud ms. 553, & Douce ms. 55 [Early English Text Society, Original Series; 91], London: N. Trübner & Co. for the Early English Text Society, volume I, OCLC 374760, page 11:

     Soupes dorye. — Take gode almaunde mylke […] caste þher-to Safroun an Salt […]

2. (chemistry) One of the compounds formed from the reaction of an acid with a base, where a positive ion replaces a hydrogen of the acid.
3. (uncommon) A salt marsh, a saline marsh at the shore of a sea.
4. (slang) A sailor (also old salt).
   • 1850, Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Scarlet Letter

     Around the door are generally to be seen, laughing and gossiping, clusters of old salts.

   • 1851, Herman Melville, Moby-Dick, chapter 1

     I never go as a passenger; nor, though I am something of a salt, do I ever go to sea as a Commodore, or a Captain, or a Cook.

5. (cryptography) Randomly chosen bytes added to a plaintext message prior to encrypting or hashing it, in order to render brute-force decryption more difficult.
6. A person who seeks employment at a company in order to (once employed by it) help unionize it.
7. (obsolete) Flavour; taste; seasoning.
   • Shakespeare

     Though we are justices and doctors and churchmen […] we have some salt of our youth in us.

8. (obsolete) Piquancy; wit; sense.

   Attic salt

9. (obsolete) A dish for salt at table; a salt cellar.
   • Samuel Pepys

     I out and bought some things; among others, a dozen of silver salts.

10. (figuratively) Skepticism and common sense.

    Any politician's statements must be taken with a grain of salt, but his need to be taken with a whole shaker of salt.

11. (Internet slang) Indignation; outrage; arguing.

    There was so much salt in that thread about the poor casting decision.

• salary

See salt/translations § Noun.

salt (comparative more salt, superlative most salt)

1. Salty; salted.

   salt beef;  salt tears

   • 1913, Joseph C. Lincoln, chapter 8, in Mr. Pratt's Patients:

     Philander went into the next room […] and came back with a salt mackerel that dripped brine like a rainstorm. Then he put the coffee pot on the stove and rummaged out a loaf of dry bread and some hardtack.

2. Saline.

   a salt marsh;  salt grass

3. Related to salt deposits, excavation, processing or use.

   a salt mine

   The salt factory is a key connecting element in the seawater infrastructure.

4. (figuratively, obsolete) Bitter; sharp; pungent.
   • c. 1604, William Shakespeare, Othello, Act III, Scene 4,

     I have a salt and sorry rheum offends me;

5. (figuratively, obsolete) Salacious; lecherous; lustful; (of animals) in heat.
   • 1603, William Shakespeare, Othello Act III, Scene 3:

     It is impossible you should see this, / Were they as prime as goats, as hot as monkeys, / As salt as wolves in pride, and fools as gross / As ignorance made drunk.

   • 1653, Thomas Urquhart (translator), The First Book of the works of Mr. Francis Rabelais, Book 2, Chapter 22, p. 153,

     And when he saw that all the dogs were flocking about her, yarring at the retardment of their accesse to her, and every way keeping such a coyle with her, as they are wont to do about a proud or salt bitch, he forthwith departed […]

• saltness
• salt spray

salt (third-person singular simple present salts, present participle salting, simple past and past participle salted)

1. (transitive) To add salt to.

   to salt fish, beef, or pork; to salt the city streets in the winter

2. (intransitive) To deposit salt as a saline solution.

   The brine begins to salt.

3. To fill with salt between the timbers and planks, as a ship, for the preservation of the timber.
4. To insert or inject something into an object to give it properties it would not naturally have.
   1. (mining) To blast metal into (as a portion of a mine) in order to cause to appear to be a productive seam.
   2. (archaeology) To add bogus evidence to an archeological site.
5. To include colorful language in.
6. (cryptography) To add filler bytes before encrypting, in order to make brute-force decryption more resource-intensive.

• (add salt): desalt

• desalt
• salt away

• Alts, TLAs, alts, last, lats, slat

From Old Occitan sal, from Latin saltus.

• (Balearic, Valencian) IPA^(key): /ˈsalt/
• (Central) IPA^(key): /ˈsal/

salt m (plural salts)

1. jump

• saltar

From Proto-Germanic *saltą, from Proto-Indo-European *seh₂l-.

salt

1. salt
   • 1562, Ogier Ghiselin de Busbecq:

     Salt. Sal.

salt

1. genitive plural of salto

From Old Norse saltr (“salt”), from Proto-Indo-European *séh₂l-, *séh₂ls, *sáls.

• IPA^(key): /salt/, [salˀd̥]

salt

1. salty, salt

From Old Norse salt (akin to Old Saxon salt, Old High German salz, Old Dutch salt, Old English sealt), from Proto-Germanic *saltą, from Proto-Indo-European *séh₂l-, *séh₂ls. Compare Icelandic, Norwegian, and Swedish salt.

• IPA^(key): /salt/, [salˀd̥]

salt n (singular definite saltet, plural indefinite salte)

1. salt

See the etymology of the main entry.

salt

1. imperative of salte

• salte
• mineralsalt

• IPA^(key): [sal̥t]

From Old Norse salt, from Proto-Germanic *saltą, from Proto-Indo-European *séh₂l-, *séh₂ls, *sáls.

salt n (genitive singular salts, plural sølt)

1. salt

• pipar
• edikur
• sinnopur
• olivinolja
• epli
• pannukøka
• rosina
• sukur
• drúvusukur
• vaniljusukur
• súltusukur
• siropur

From Old Norse saltr (“salt”), from Proto-Indo-European *séh₂l-, *séh₂ls, *sáls.

salt

1. salty

From Latin saltus.

salt m (plural salts)

1. jump, leap, spring

• saltâ

salt

1. Romanization of 𐍃𐌰𐌻𐍄

From Old Norse salt, from Proto-Germanic *saltą, from Proto-Indo-European *séh₂l-, *séh₂ls, *sáls.

• IPA^(key): /sal̥t/

• listen

  (file)

• Rhymes: -al̥t

salt n (genitive singular salts, nominative plural sölt)

1. salt

   Geturðu rétt mér saltið?

   Can you pass me the salt?

• salta
• saltstaukur
• saltsýra
• vega salt

salt

1. positive neuter singular nominative or accusative of saltur

From Proto-Indo-European *ḱel- (“cold; hot”). Cognates include Lithuanian šálti.

salt intr., 1st conj., pres. salstu, salsti, salst, past salu

1. to freeze

• selt, sealt, salte, zalt, saulte, sawt, scealte

From Old English sealt, from Proto-Germanic *saltą (noun) and Proto-Germanic *saltaz (adjective).

• IPA^(key): /salt/, /sɛlt/

salt (uncountable)

1. salt (sodium chloride)
2. Something containing or for storing salt
3. Any of a group of crystalline compounds that resemble salt

• salten
• salthous

• English: salt
• Scots: sawt, salt, saut

• “salt (n.(1))” in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007, retrieved 2018-04-08.

salt (inflected form salte, comparative salter, superlative saltest)

1. salty, tasting of salt
2. salted, coated in salt

• English: salt
• Scots: sawt, salt, saut

• “salt (adj.)” in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007, retrieved 2018-04-08.

From Old Norse saltr.

salt (neuter singular salt, definite singular and plural salte, comparative saltere, indefinite superlative saltest, definite superlative salteste)

1. salty, salt, salted

   salte peanøtter - salted peanuts

From Old Norse salt (akin to Old Saxon salt, Old High German salz, Old Dutch salt, Old English sealt), from Proto-Germanic *saltą, from Proto-Indo-European *séh₂l-, *séh₂ls. Compare Danish, Swedish and Icelandic salt.

salt n (definite singular saltet, indefinite plural salter, definite plural salta or saltene)

1. salt

salt

1. imperative of salte

• “salt” in The Bokmål Dictionary.

• IPA^(key): /sɑlt/

From Old Norse saltr.

salt (neuter singular salt, definite singular and plural salte, comparative saltare, indefinite superlative saltast, definite superlative saltaste)

1. salty, salt, salted

From Old Norse salt (akin to Old Saxon salt, Old High German salz, Old Dutch salt, Old English sealt), from Proto-Germanic *saltą, from Proto-Indo-European *séh₂l-, *séh₂ls.

salt n (definite singular saltet, indefinite plural salt, definite plural salta)

1. salt

• “salt” in The Nynorsk Dictionary.

From Old Norse salt.

salt n

1. salt

• Danish: salt

From Old Norse saltr.

salt

1. salty, salt

• Danish: salt

From Proto-Germanic *saltą (“salt”), *saltaz (“salty, salted”).

salt n

1. salt

• North Frisian:

  Föhr-Amrum: saalt

• West Frisian: sâlt

salt

1. salty, salted

• West Frisian: sâlt

From Latin saltus.

• IPA^(key): /ˈsalt/

salt n (plural salturi)

1. leap
2. saltation

• sălta
• săltare
• săltat
• săltăreț
• săltător
• săltătură

From Old Swedish salter, from Old Norse saltr, from Proto-Germanic *saltaz, from Proto-Indo-European *séh₂l-, *séh₂ls, *sáls.

• IPA^(key): /salt/

• audio

  (file)

salt (comparative saltare, superlative saltast)

1. salty

From Old Swedish salt, from Old Norse salt (akin to Old Saxon salt, Old High German salz, Old Dutch salt, Old English sealt), from Proto-Germanic *saltą, from Proto-Indo-European *séh₂l-, *séh₂ls. Compare Danish, Icelandic, Norwegian salt.

salt n

1. salt
   1. (uncountable) sodium chloride (NaCl), used extensively as a condiment and preservative.
   2. (chemistry) One of the compounds formed from the reaction of an acid with a base, where a positive ion replaces a hydrogen of the acid.

• bordssalt

• bergsalt
• havssalt
• medelhavssalt
• saltlake
• saltkristall
• saltstänkt
• saltsyra

• salta
• sälta

• IPA^(key): /saɫt/

salt

1. (obsolete) exclusively

   Synonyms: bir, münhasıran, sade, sadece, sırf, tek, yalnız, yalnızca