[3] The river's historically changeable meanders across the low coastal plain have been artificially channeled into the Canale di Sicilia, and the marshes drained for agriculture.

The mouth of the Salso has been advancing during historical times, and wind and wave formerly distributed its sand and silt to the beaches of the Gulf of Gela.

[2] Himera was the ancient name of two rivers in Sicily, the Imera Settentrionale flowing to the north into the Tyrrhenian Sea, and the Salso to the south coast of the island, but which, by a strange confusion, were regarded by many ancient writers as one and the same river, which is in consequence described as rising in the center of the island, and flowing in two different directions, so as completely to divide Sicily into two parts.

[5] But it is evidently this circumstance, coupled with the fact that there was another river of the same name flowing into the Tyrrhenian Sea, which gave rise to the fable above noticed.

Diodorus mentions the brackish quality of the waters of the Himera, which gives rise to its modern name of Fiume Salso: this is caused by the junction of a small stream near Caltanisetta, that flows from the salt mines in that vicinity.

During the Second Punic War, Carthage and Hieronymus of Syracuse agreed to divide the whole of Sicily between them, so the river Himera (Salso) would have again been the boundary of their respective dominions.