Salt
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Salt, also known as sodium chloride, (TV: Four to Doomsday [+]Loading...["Four to Doomsday (TV story)"]) was a mineral that was used on Earth as a preservative and flavour enhancer.
The First Doctor asked the Sensorites for salt when Ian Chesterton collapsed from Atropa belladonna poisoning. He was able to use salt and water as a remedy for Ian. (TV: "A Race Against Death" [+]Part of The Sensorites, Loading...{"namedep":"A Race Against Death (4)","1":"The Sensorites (TV story)"})
Due to its unique chemical properties, disrupting the osmotic balance and electrical conductivity of their cells, table salt could act as a defence against the Fendahl. The Fourth Doctor could kill Fendahleen by firing table salt out of a shotgun. The power of salt to ward off evil, then, entered into human folklore in the form of throwing salt over one's shoulder for good luck. (TV: Image of the Fendahl [+]Loading...["Image of the Fendahl (TV story)"]) The Hervoken were also similarly vulnerable to salt. (PROSE: Forever Autumn [+]Loading...["Forever Autumn (novel)"])
Around 6100 BC Osirans utilised salt-based spacecraft. At this time, Sekhmet was entombed in a spaceship made from trisilicate, which was "the hardest form of salt in the galaxy". In Earth "old wives' tales", salt was used to ward off "evil". (AUDIO: The Bride of Peladon [+]Loading...["The Bride of Peladon (audio story)"])
After spilling salt at dinner, Winifred Gillyflower fed some to Mister Sweet. (TV: The Crimson Horror [+]Loading...["The Crimson Horror (TV story)"])
After rejecting pure salt for being "too salty", the Tenth Doctor ate anchovies containing salt as part of a treatment to eject cyanide from his body. (TV: The Unicorn and the Wasp [+]Loading...["The Unicorn and the Wasp (TV story)"])
A container of salt was present on a shelf in a house raided by Nancy to feed homeless children in London during the Blitz by at least 20 January 1941. (TV: The Empty Child [+]Loading...["The Empty Child (TV story)"])
Adric annoyed Tegan by requesting that she pass him "the sodium chloride". At first, she did not know what he meant. (TV: Four to Doomsday [+]Loading...["Four to Doomsday (TV story)"]) The Fourth Doctor also expressed annoyance at this, believing Adric to be showing off his intelligence. (AUDIO: A Full Life [+]Loading...["A Full Life (audio story)"])
Eating a portion of fries that had passed through the Arc of Infinity, Omega was disappointed to find that they had no salt on them. (PROSE: Anti-Matter with Fries [+]Loading...["Anti-Matter with Fries (short story)"])
Clyde Langer suggested that the Slitheen were allergic to the salt in his cold chip sandwich. Luke Smith noted that if the Slitheen were made mostly of water it would dehydrate them like slugs. However, that theory was debunked as salt was contained in the bread and water of the sandwich another Slitheen ate. It was soon realised that the Slitheen were calcium-based and allergic to vinegar. (TV: Revenge of the Slitheen [+]Loading...["Revenge of the Slitheen (TV story)"])
Salt 'n' vinegar was a flavour of crisps. (PROSE: Citation Needed [+]Loading...["Citation Needed (short story)"])
Salt was the currency of the Sontila. (AUDIO: The Doctor's Coat [+]Loading...["The Doctor's Coat (audio story)"])
In the fifth parallel universe that Rose Tyler visited in her attempts to return to N-Space, an automated mining ship was teleporting the salt out of Earth's oceans, unknowingly causing mass ecological damage. It ceased its operations when the people of Earth managed to communicate to it that sentient life existed on the planet. (AUDIO: Saltwater [+]Loading...["Saltwater (audio story)"])
But...salt! You can't cross salt. In our universe, it is said that vampires, demons and ghosts cannot cross a line of salt until they've counted every single grain. You've got no choice.
The Fourteenth Doctor used an old superstition regarding Vampires, Demons and Ghosts needing to count every grain of salt before they crossed it to hold back the not-things at the edge of the universe, until they realised they could just blow the salt line away. Once he was back in the safety of his TARDIS, the Doctor worried if there would be consequences for invoking a superstition at the edge of the universe, "where the walls [were] thin and all things [were] possible". However, he quickly dismissed his unease about it, (TV: Wild Blue Yonder [+]Loading...["Wild Blue Yonder (TV story)"]) until he learnt his trick had allowed the Toymaker to "cross the line" out of his realm and have free reign in the Doctor's universe. Following the defeat of the Toymaker, Kate Lethbridge-Stewart ordered UNIT to put the box holding him in their deepest vault and to bind it in salt. (TV: The Giggle [+]Loading...["The Giggle (TV story)"])
