above the salt in English

Audio: en-au-above the salt.ogg

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Etymology: In medieval times, salt (a valuable seasoning) was placed in the middle of a dining table and the lord and his family were seated "above the salt" and other guests or servants below. Head templates: {{head|en|prepositional phrase|head=}} above the salt, {{en-prep phrase}} above the salt

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{
  "antonyms": [
    {
      "word": "below the salt"
    }
  ],
  "etymology_text": "In medieval times, salt (a valuable seasoning) was placed in the middle of a dining table and the lord and his family were seated \"above the salt\" and other guests or servants below.",
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "prepositional phrase",
        "head": ""
      },
      "expansion": "above the salt",
      "name": "head"
    },
    {
      "args": {},
      "expansion": "above the salt",
      "name": "en-prep phrase"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "prep_phrase",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
          "parents": [
            "Entries with incorrect language header",
            "Entry maintenance"
          ],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "Pages with 1 entry",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "Pages with entries",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "Of high standing or honor."
      ],
      "id": "en-above_the_salt-en-prep_phrase-BELnac15",
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(idiomatic) Of high standing or honor."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "idiomatic"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "sounds": [
    {
      "audio": "en-au-above the salt.ogg",
      "mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/a/a8/En-au-above_the_salt.ogg/En-au-above_the_salt.ogg.mp3",
      "ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a8/En-au-above_the_salt.ogg"
    }
  ],
  "word": "above the salt"
}

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{
  "antonyms": [
    {
      "word": "below the salt"
    }
  ],
  "etymology_text": "In medieval times, salt (a valuable seasoning) was placed in the middle of a dining table and the lord and his family were seated \"above the salt\" and other guests or servants below.",
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "prepositional phrase",
        "head": ""
      },
      "expansion": "above the salt",
      "name": "head"
    },
    {
      "args": {},
      "expansion": "above the salt",
      "name": "en-prep phrase"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "prep_phrase",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        "English entries with incorrect language header",
        "English idioms",
        "English lemmas",
        "English multiword terms",
        "English prepositional phrases",
        "Pages with 1 entry",
        "Pages with entries"
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "Of high standing or honor."
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(idiomatic) Of high standing or honor."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "idiomatic"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "sounds": [
    {
      "audio": "en-au-above the salt.ogg",
      "mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/a/a8/En-au-above_the_salt.ogg/En-au-above_the_salt.ogg.mp3",
      "ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a8/En-au-above_the_salt.ogg"
    }
  ],
  "word": "above the salt"
}

This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2025-02-03 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2025-01-20 using wiktextract (05fdf6b and 9dbd323). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.

"above the salt" meaning in English

Prepositional phrase