# salty

Pronunciation: US say "SAWL-tee" /sɔl.ti/; UK/AUS say "SOL-tee" /ˈsɒl.ti/

## Adjective

1. Having the flavor of salt.
   - Simple: Having the taste of salt.
   - _The broth tasted unexpectedly salty after extra stock went in._
   - _Fresh oysters carry a salty tang straight from the sea._
2. Holding salt as one of its contents.
   - Simple: Having salt in it or mixed with salt.
   - _The salty marsh soil supports only a few hardy plants._
   - _Engineers worried that the salty groundwater would corrode the pipes._
3. Irritated, angry, or bitter, often over something minor. *(slang)*
   - Simple: Upset, annoyed, or bitter, often about something small.
   - _She was still salty about not making the team._
   - _The losing players turned salty and blamed the referee._
4. Coarse, earthy, and deliberately provocative, especially of language or humor.
   - Simple: Rough, bold, and a little rude, especially in humor or language.
   - _Her memoir is full of salty anecdotes she never told in public._
   - _The novel's salty dialogue earned it a mature rating._
5. Highly experienced, especially as a seasoned veteran of naval service.
   - Simple: Having a lot of experience, especially as an old sailor.
   - _The crew respected their salty chief, who had decades at sea behind him._
   - _A salty old sailor can read the weather better than any instrument._
6. Pertaining to Sardinian and those Catalan dialects of the Balearic Islands and the Catalan coast whose definite articles descend from Latin ipse rather than ille.
   - Simple: About Sardinian and the Catalan of Spain's islands and coast, where 'the' comes from a Latin word meaning 'self'.
   - _Her thesis compares the salty dialects of Mallorca with the Catalan spoken in Barcelona._
   - _Sardinian is the best-known salty variety in the region._

## Origin

From Middle English salti, equivalent to salt plus the suffix -y. It is related to words like West Frisian sâltich, Dutch zoutig, and German salzig, all meaning "salty." The slang senses come from the sharp, spicy flavor of salt, or perhaps from the idea of someone shedding salty tears.

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/salty (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).