Marsala

name, noun

name, noun ·3 syllables ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    A fortified wine from Sicily. countable, uncountable
  2. 2
    Alternative letter-case form of Marsala (sauce). alt-of, countable, uncountable

    "The result: a dish that features polenta cut into triangles and delicately complemented by sweet, diced prunes and a marsala sauce."

  3. 3
    dark sweet or semisweet dessert wine from Sicily wordnet
  4. 4
    A sauce made from that wine, or (loosely) made from a similar wine from elsewhere. countable, uncountable
Proper Noun
  1. 1
    A town in western Sicily.

Synonyms

All synonyms
fortified winemadeirasherry

Example

More examples

"The result: a dish that features polenta cut into triangles and delicately complemented by sweet, diced prunes and a marsala sauce."

Etymology

From Sicilian Marsala, from an Arabic name, probably مَرْسَى عَلِيّ (marsā ʕaliyy, “Ali's harbor”), or possibly مَرْسَى اللّٰه (marsā llāh, “God's harbor”). In any case, the first element is مَرْسَى (marsā, “harbor”).

Related phrases

fortified wine

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.