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When the word brackish first appeared in English in the 1500s, it simply meant "salty," as did its Dutch parent brak. (English speakers also adopted the synonymous brack from the same source but it gets very little use.) Then, as now, brackish was used to describe water that was a mixture of saltwater and freshwater, such as one encounters where a river meets the sea. Since that time, however, brackish has developed the additional meanings of "unpalatable" and "repulsive," presumably because of the oozy, mucky, and sometimes stinky (or stinkyish, if you prefer)—not just salty—qualities of coastal estuaries and swamps.
Examples of brackish in a Sentence
Ritsuko Kawai, Wired News, 5 May 2025
Because of pollution, depletion, and seepage of water from the sea, the groundwater was of poor quality—brackish and salty, with a high level of chemicals.
—Claudine Ebeid, The Atlantic, 6 Feb. 2025
Cypress trees with pleated skirt-like roots grow deep into the brackish water of the bayous that make up the preserve, home to alligators, snakes, birds, and fish.
—Cynthia Drake, Southern Living, 10 Apr. 2025
Dark long-body snake eels live in brackish water where the Mekong River meets the South China Sea.
—Aspen Pflughoeft, Miami Herald, 19 Mar. 2025
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Cite this Entry
“Brackish.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/brackish. Accessed 28 May. 2025.
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brackish
adjective
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