salt cellar
See also: saltcellar
English
An English glass salt cellar, circa 1720
Alternative forms
- saltcellar, salt-cellar
Etymology
From salt + cellar, from 15th Century Middle English saler, from Middle French salier, from Latin salārius (“relating to salt”), from Latin sāl (“salt”). Modified based on originally unrelated English cellar.
Noun
salt cellar (plural salt cellars)
- A small open container holding salt for use in the kitchen or on a dining table.
- 1860 December – 1861 August, Charles Dickens, Great Expectations […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), London: Chapman and Hall, […], published October 1861, OCLC 3359935:
- Soon afterwards, Biddy, Joe, and I, had a cold dinner together; but we dined in the best parlour, not in the old kitchen, and Joe was so exceedingly particular what he did with his knife and fork and the saltcellar and what not, that there was great restraint upon us.
- c. 1867, Anthony Trollope, chapter XXVII, in The Claverings:
- And she had no love for the sea specially, regarding all winds as nuisances excepting such as had been raised by her own efforts, and thinking that salt from a saltcellar was more convenient than that brought to her on the breezes.
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- (UK) Synonym of salt shaker (“a closed container with perforated lid for sprinkling salt”)
Synonyms
- salt (obsolete)
Translations
container holding salt for use in the kitchen or on a dining table
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Further reading
salt cellar on Wikipedia.Wikipedia