Salt

/sɒlt/ · noun

Meaning

A common substance, chemically consisting mainly of sodium chloride (NaCl), used extensively as a food ingredient, seasoning, condiment, and preservative..

Definitions by Sense

1. A common substance, chemically consisting mainly of sodium chloride (NaCl), used extensively as a food ingredient, seasoning, 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.
3. (uncommon, countable) A salt marsh, a saline marsh at the shore of a sea.
4. (slang, countable) A sailor (also old salt).
5. (cryptography) A sequence of random data added to plain text data (such as passwords or messages) prior to encryption or hashing, in order to make 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, uncountable) Flavour; taste; seasoning.
8. (obsolete, uncountable) Piquancy; wit; sense.

Example Sentences

Near-synonyms: table salt, rock salt, road salt

Take gode almaunde mylke y-draw wyth wyn, an let hem boyle to-gederys, an caste þer-to Safroun an Salt; […]

Common salt, chloride of sodium, appears to be essential to the life of the higher animals.

Nando was pierced with grief, but he didn't allow himself to cry. Tears, he knew, would cost his body salt. Without salt, you die.

Here’s a grocery list of foods Chestnut has eaten competitively, drawn from his Major League Eating bio: apple pie, asparagus, boysenberry pie, brats, burritos, chicken spiedies (a kind of sandwich), chicken wings, chili, corned beef sandwiches, eggs, fish tacos, funnel cake, grilled cheese sandwiches, gyoza, Krystal hamburgers, horseshoe sandwiches, hot dogs, ice cream, jalapeno poppers, kolaches, pastrami sandwiches, Philly cheesesteaks, pierogi, pizza, pork ribs, pulled pork, poutine, salt potatoes, shrimp, tacos, tamales, turkey and Twinkies.

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

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.

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

Synonyms for salt

Antonyms for salt

Related Words

Word Forms

• salts
• more salt
• most salt
• salting
• salted

Usage Notes

Choose a synonym only when it preserves the intended meaning, tone, and grammar of the full sentence.

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