


Salt was said to have healing properties, so to eat a meal 'with a pinch of salt' meant that you suspected the meal of being poisoned. The saying came from the old cure for poison - a pinch of salt. AnswerTo take 'with a grain of salt' means to take with a heavy dose of skepticism, caution and suspicion. says that the expression is a translation of the Latin cum grano salis, which Pliny used in describing Pompey's discovery of an antidote for poison (to be taken with a grain of salt). For example, if someone has a tendency to exaggerate, you'll want to take what they have said with a grain or pinch of salt. Basically, it means to be skeptical or to question something that someone has told you. AnswerMy grandmother used to say this to me all the time. It is a warning that what that person has said, or may say, is not necessarily correct and accurate. The phrase is usually used when a person it giving you the 'low down' on what another person has told you. The pinch of salt variant came much later, around the mid 1900s.With a Grain of SaltYou should take what you hear and evaluate it on your own, don't take it for being the truth or correct. In its current meaning, however, it has been used since the 1600s. It is said that Pliny the Elder translated an ancient antidote for poison in 77 A.D., which recommends taking the antidote with a grain of salt. This great expression, although an ancient one, was not used in its current meaning till much later.

