Saline means containing salt. A saline solution, saline drip, saline soil.
The medical kind is nine grams of salt in a litre of water, which matches the concentration in blood — that is why it can go into a vein where plain water would burst the cells. Saline soil is what irrigation leaves behind when the water evaporates.
1adjectivesalineContaining salt.
“The nurse cleaned the wound with a saline solution.”
saline is a quality of saltiness.
Latin salinus comes from sal, salt. Salary, salad and sauce all come from the same salt.
Proto-Indo-European
*sḗh₂l
Latin
sal — salt
Middle French
salin
Medieval Latin
salīna
Middle English
salyne
English, today
saline
From Middle English salyne, from Medieval Latin salīna and Middle French salin, from Latin sal (“salt”).
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA