Bible Dictionary
SALT-WORT
Salt-wort is a silvery shrub associated with salty shores, especially around the Dead Sea. Its sour leaves were eaten by the poor when better food was unavailable.
Definition
Salt-wort is the sea orache, a silvery, whitish shrub that grows beside salty shores. Its oval leaves resemble olive leaves and have a sour flavor. The plant would not ordinarily be eaten when better food was available.
Biblical Usage
Salt-wort is associated with the food of the poor in Job, where its sour leaves are presented as something eaten only when more desirable food could not be obtained.
Historical Background
The plant identified is Atriplex halimus, which flourishes along the shores of the Dead Sea beside the rutm. The older translation “mallows” arose from the apparent similarity between the Hebrew word malluach and the Greek malache.
Related Figures
Historical Bible Dictionaries
International Standard Bible Encyclopedia (ISBE)
<p>solt'-wurt (malluach, a word connected with melach, "salt," translated halimos; the King James Version, mallows): The halimos of the Greeks is the sea orache, Atriplex halimus, a silvery whitish shrub which flourishes upon the shores of the Dead Sea alongside the rutm (see JUNIPER). Its leaves are oval and somewhat like those of an olive. They have a sour flavor and would never be eaten when better food was obtainable (Job 30:4). The translation "mallows" is due to the apparent similarity of the Hebrew malluach to the Greek malache, which is the Latin malva and English "mallow." Certain species of malva known in Arabic, as khubbazeh, are very commonly eaten by the poor of Palestine.</p><p>E. W. G. Masterman</p>