salt mine
Americannoun
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a mine from which salt is excavated.
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Usually salt mines. a place of habitual confinement and drudgery.
After two weeks of vacation it will be back to the salt mines for the staff.
Etymology
Origin of salt mine
First recorded in 1675–85
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
It has also been found in 3,000-year-old faeces preserved in a salt mine in Hallstatt, Austria -- which serves as one of the only other available views into the ancient human microbiome.
From Barron's ● Jun. 3, 2026
The salt mine they worked for didn’t have modern equipment.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 13, 2026
The “Romeo and Juliet” director’s research team stumbled upon this unseen footage in an underground salt mine in Kansas while making the 2022 biopic starring Austin Butler.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 3, 2026
That's also been placed in the Memory of Mankind repository, another vault safeguarding historic documents, hidden in a salt mine in Austria.
From BBC ● May 8, 2025
I felt trapped again, like I had felt under the floorboards and down in the salt mine.
From "Prisoner B-3087" by Alan Gratz
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
