salinity

Etymology

It is formed from English saline + -ity.^{[2][3][4][5][6]} The OED compares French salinité.^[2] Saline is from Latin *salīnus, from sāl (“salt”);^[2][6] Etymonline takes it instead as probably from Latin salīnum (“salt cellar”) or salīnae (“salt pits”),^[3] and Hoad from Medieval Latin salīnum.^[7] Etymonline traces the Latin noun to Proto-Indo-European *sal- (“salt”).^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

The quality of being saline, saltness: 1694, in R. Franck's Northern Memoirs.^[2] The 1989 edition of the OED had a quotation of 1658,^[8] Etymonline dates the word to the 1650s,^[3] and the Shorter Oxford to the mid 17th century.^[5]

Semantic evolution

At first the word meant saltness in general.^[2] The Shorter Oxford adds the measured sense, the concentration of dissolved salts in water, usually given in parts per thousand by weight,^[5] and Merriam-Webster Unabridged records the plural salinities for such concentrations.^[4] The geological compound salinity crisis, from 1967, names a period of greatly increased evaporation and salinity in the Mediterranean in the late Miocene.^[8][5]

Timeline

• 1694 – saltness, the quality of being saline.^[2] The 1989 edition of the OED dated it to 1658, and Etymonline to the 1650s.^[8][3]
• 1967 – “salinity crisis”, in geology.^[8]

Meanings

Noun

1. The quality of being saline; saltiness.^[4][2][1]
2. The concentration of dissolved salt in water or another solution, usually measured in parts per thousand: The salinity of the lagoon rises in the dry season.^[5][4]

Word family

• hypersalinity

References

1. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b c d Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
5. ^ a b c d e Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
6. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
7. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
8. ^ a b c d Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press