Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun A small dish for holding and dispensing salt.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A small vessel for holding salt, used on the table. See salt, 4.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun Formerly a large vessel, now a small vessel of glass or other material, used for holding salt on the table.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun Alternative form of salt cellar.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun a small container for holding salt at the dining table

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Alteration of Middle English salt-saler : salt, salt; see salt + saler, saltcellar (from Old French saliere, from Medieval Latin salāria, from Latin, feminine of salārius, of salt, from sāl, salt; see sal- in Indo-European roots).]

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Examples

  • From its four hands hung the crystal saltcellar that had been a wedding gift from her mother.

    The Lives of Felix Gunderson Sugu Althomsons 2010

  • There were water buckets, assorted bottles and flasks, a saltcellar, and a mortar and pestle.

    Belongings: Property, Family, and Identity in Colonial South Africa 2008

  • Cellini worked in France for a period in the early 1540's, during which time he fashioned his famous saltcellar.

    Archive 2008-03-01 Julianne Douglas 2008

  • Cellini worked in France for a period in the early 1540's, during which time he fashioned his famous saltcellar.

    The Answers You've All Been Waiting For Julianne Douglas 2008

  • So when a $50 million 16th-century sculpted saltcellar went missing from Vienna's art-history museum last month, officials knew right away whom to call.

    The Purloined Painting 2008

  • The Neruda poems are of course quite wonderful, but I probably never would have encountered them if my eye had not been caught that day by the understated but elegant drawing of a saltcellar on the cover.

    Archive 2007-02-01 Bruce Schauble 2007

  • Soon afterwards, Biddy, Joe, and I, had a cold dinner together; but we dined in the best parlor, 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.

    Great Expectations 2007

  • The Neruda poems are of course quite wonderful, but I probably never would have encountered them if my eye had not been caught that day by the understated but elegant drawing of a saltcellar on the cover.

    Common Things Bruce Schauble 2007

  • 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.

    The Claverings 2005

  • He turned the saltcellar a half turn on the tabletop.

    No Country For Old Men McCarthy, Cormac, 1933- 2005

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