salter

Etymology

It is inherited from Old English sealtere (“salt-worker, salt-maker”),^{[2][3][4][5][6]} a derivative with the agent suffix -ere of sealtan (“to salt”) according to the OED,^[2] or of the noun sealt (“salt”) according to Etymonline, Klein and Merriam-Webster.^[3][5][4] The noun salt goes back to Proto-Germanic *saltą, also the source of Old Norse salt, Dutch zout and German Salz, and to Proto-Indo-European *sal- (“salt”).^[3][7]

Earliest recorded meaning

A maker of or dealer in salt: Old English, before 1000, in a glossary where it translates Latin salinator, and in Ælfric's Grammar.^[8][2][6][9]

Semantic evolution

The trade sense has lasted from Old English to the present, and in the name of the Salters, one of the London livery companies (incorporated in 1558), the word has the special sense of drysalter.^[2][10] From 1606 it was also a workman at a salt-works, from 1611 someone who salts meat or fish, and in 1705 one who salted bodies in embalming.^[2] Johnson (1755) gave both "one who salts" and "one who sells salt", quoting Camden on surnames taken from occupations such as smith, salter and armorer.^[11] In Scots and northern dialect a salter was a salt-worker or a seller of salt; in the North Riding of Yorkshire he went from farm to farm at bacon-time with salt in horse panniers, and an uncouth person was said to be "as coarse as an old salter".^[12] In Shetland the salter laid split fish in salt,^[12] and the same fish-curing sense is Canadian, recorded from 1760: a member of a cod-pickling crew who washes and salts the fish.^[13][14] A large vessel for salting meat was a salter in English dialect from 1884.^[2] In American regional English the word has named, since 1890, a brook trout that has gone down into salt water, and an old-fashioned open salt cellar on the table;^[15][4] in Canada it is also a truck that spreads salt on roads.^[14]

Timeline

• before 1000 – a maker of or dealer in salt.^[8][6]
• 1606 – a workman at a salt-works.^[2]
• 1611 – one who salts meat or fish.^[2]
• 1705 – one who salts bodies in embalming.^[2]
• 1760 – in Canada, a member of a fish-curing crew who salts the cod.^[13]
• 1884 – in dialect, a large vessel in which meat is salted.^[2]
• 1890 – in New England, a brook trout returning from the sea.^[15]

Meanings

Noun

1. A person who makes or deals in salt.^[16][4][2]
2. A person who salts meat, fish, hides or the like to season or preserve them.^[16][4][2]
3. (British) A drysalter.^[4][2]
4. A worker at a saltworks.^[2][10]
5. A trough or vessel in which meat is salted.^[4][2]
6. (US, regional) A brook trout that lives in or returns from salt water.^[4][15]
7. (Canada) A truck that spreads salt on roads to melt snow and ice.^[14]

Word family

• drysalter

Related words

• salt

Usage notes

The OED also records an obsolete salter of 1688, from R. Holme's Academy of Armory, a double-headed axe, perhaps a use of saltire from its shape.^[2]

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b c d e f g h Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
5. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
6. ^ a b c Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement
7. ^ Orel, Vladimir (2003), A Handbook of Germanic Etymology, Leiden / Boston: Brill
8. ^ a b Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
9. ^ Clark Hall, J. R. (1960), A Concise Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, 4th ed., with a supplement by H. D. Meritt, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
10. ^ a b Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
11. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
12. ^ a b Wright, Joseph, ed. (1898–1905), The English Dialect Dictionary, 6 vols., Oxford: Henry Frowde; via EDD Online 4.0, University of Innsbruck (CC BY 4.0)
13. ^ a b Dollinger, Stefan, ed., A Dictionary of Canadianisms on Historical Principles, 3rd ed. (online), Vancouver: University of British Columbia, dchp.arts.ubc.ca
14. ^ a b c Barber, Katherine, ed. (2004), The Canadian Oxford Dictionary, 2nd ed., Toronto: Oxford University Press
15. ^ a b c Cassidy, Frederic G. & Joan Houston Hall (eds.) (1985–2002), Dictionary of American Regional English, vols I–IV, Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press
16. ^ a b Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins