NITER (ni'ter), (Heb. nek'ther; Gr. virpop, nee'tran).
Now denotes saltpeter, nitrate of potash, but the vtrpor or nitrztnt of the ancients was a different substance, natron, carbonate of soda. It occurs as an incrustation on the ground in Egypt, Persia, and elsewhere, and is also a constituent in the water of certain saline lakes. The most famous of the latter are the 'natron lakes' in Egypt. They lie in the 'natron valley' about 6o miles W.N.W. of Cairo. The deposit of these lakes includes an up per layer of common salt and a lower one of natron (Wilkinson, Modern Egypt, i. 382, sq.). Strabo mentions these Egyptian lakes (Geog. xvii, i. 23), and also a similar lake in Armenia (ib. xi. xiv :8). See also Pliny, Nat. Hist. xxxi:To.
It is found in many other parts of the East. Vin egar has no effect upon common niter, and of course this could not be meant by the wise man, who in Prov. XXV :20 says, "As he that taketh
away a garment in cold weather, and as vinegar upon niter, so is he that singeth songs to a heavy heart." Now, as vinegar has no effect upon niter, but upon itatron or soda its action is very ob vious, it seems the English translation should have been "natron." In Jer. ii:22 the same word again is improperly used : "For though thou wash thee with niter, and take thee much soap, yet thine in iquity is marked before me, saith the Lord God." The alkaline earth natron is obviously designed in this passage. It is found as an impure carbonate of soda on the surface of the earth in F.gypt and Syria, and is also native in some parts of Africa in hard strata or masses, and is called trona. being used for the same purposes as the barilla of com merce. (SeC NETER.) NO (no). Sec No-AmoN; THEBES.