n.
A saltworks.
[Old English sealtærn : sealt, salt; see salt + ærn, house.]
saltern
Dictionary:
salt·ern (sôl'tərn) 
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| Archaeology Dictionary: saltern |
[MC]
A place where salt was produced by evaporating the water from brine to leave crystalline salt blocks. In northern Europe most salterns are situated on the coast and comprise a series of large open tanks that could be flooded with a controlled amount of seawater at high tide before being closed off to allow natural evaporation to concentrate the solution. When the brine in the open tanks was sufficiently salt-rich it would be taken to smaller tanks that could be heated by fires underneath in order to be further concentrated. In later prehistoric and Romano-British times, highly concentrated salt water would be placed in ceramic containers (briquetage) for final reduction and drying in purpose-built hearths. Inland, salterns are also found around saline springs such as in Cheshire, England.
Archaeologically salterns can be identified by the earthwork remains of the preliminary evaporation tanks and the extensive areas of burning associated with the reducing hearths. In Essex, England, these areas of burning have become known as ‘red hills’.
| Wikipedia: Saltern |
Saltern is a word with a number of differing (but interrelated) meanings. In English archaeology, a saltern is a term used to describe an area used for salt making, especially in the East Anglian fenlands.
The term saltern also describes modern salt-making works, and contain hypersaline waters that usually contain high concentrations of halophilic microorganisms, primarily haloarchaea but also other halophiles including algae and bacteria. Salterns usually begin with seawater as the initial source of brine but may also use natural saltwater springs and streams. The water is evaporated, usually over a series of ponds, to the point where NaCl and other salts precipitate out of the saturated brine, allowing pure salts to be harvested. In England, complete evaporation in this fashion was not routinely achievable and salt from the concentrated brine was produced by boiling the brine.
Earliest examples of pans used in the solution mining of salt date back to prehistoric times and the pans were made of ceramics known as briquetage. Later examples were made from lead and then iron. The change from lead to iron coincided with a change from wood to coal for the purpose of heating the brine. Brine would be pumped into the pans, and concentrated by the heat of the fire burning underneath. As crystals of salt formed these would be raked out and more brine added. In warmer climates no additional heat would be supplied, the sun's heat being sufficient to evaporate off the brine.
See also
References
- This article incorporates text from Dawlish.com, a site which allows free use of its content.
- Salt Making in the Adur Valley
- Archaeology, arable landscapes and drainage ...Excavations at the
Bourne-Morton Canal and the Roman saltern recorded. Archaeology, arable landscapes and drainage in the Fenland of Eastern England.
- A medieval saltern mound at Millfields Caravan Park, Bramber,West Medieval (13th-16th century) saltern mound
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 | Dictionary. The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition Copyright © 2007, 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2009. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. Read more |
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| Archaeology Dictionary. The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Archaeology. Copyright © 2002, 2003 by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved. Read more |
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| Wikipedia. This article is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Saltern". Read more |
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Mentioned in
- salt garden (engineering)
- saltworks (engineering)
- red hill (in archaeology)
- briquetage (in archaeology)
