This paper explores the references on the term salinae from Justinian’ Digest. Our approach is a semantic analysis of this term in various juridic contexts, such as: allowing permission by the state to constitute corporations for saltworks; the interdiction to alienate a saltpan from a pupillus; collecting the tax on salt-works; establishing the usufruct of inherited saltpans; the recognition of saltworks owners as publicani; the imposition of serving in saltworks as a punishment for a crime; exploring gender issues (the appliance of the same type of penalty to men and women convicted to saltworks labour); the obligation to acknowledge for the census the saltpans; the recognition of the tax on saltworks as a “public” one.