ELEMENT NAMES
Ac
Al
Am
Sb
Gr
L
Amer
L
Gr
Gr
Arabic
Pers
Gr
aktinos
alumen
america
stibium
anti + monos
a + ergon
az-zernikh
zerni-zar
arsenikos
At
Ba
Bk
Be
Bi
B
Br
Cd
Ca
Cf
C
Ce
Gr
Gr
Amer
L
Ger
Arabic
Gr
Gr
L
Amer
L
L
a + statos
barys
Berkeley
beryl
weisse masse
buraq
bromos
cadmia
calx
California
carbo
Ceres
Cl
Cs
Cr
Gr
L
Gr
chloros
caesius
chroma
Co
Ger
kobold
Cu
L
Cuprum
Cm
Dy
Er
Eu
Fm
F
Fr
Gr
Swed
It
Fr
Curie
dysprositos
Ytterby
Europe
Enrico Fermi
fluere
Fr
Gd
Ga
Finn
L
France
Gadolin
Gallia, Gaul
Ar
As
ray
alum
the americas
mark
“single”
“without work”
from the persian
gold
male (from the belief that metals have genders)
(notice that this is male AND a poison!)
“not standing” (unstable)
heavy
home of U of California
sweet
“white mass”
(ancient) (root of Borax)
stench
earth
ancient for calamine (zinc carbonate)
state of California
charcoal
god of war (element was named after the planetoid
discovered two years before in 1801)
greenish yellow (the color of chlorine gas)
sky blue
color ("Chromatic Scale" in music is the one "with all
the colors" and all the notes)
goblin or evil spirit (miners thought it was placed in
mines by spirits to hide the "good" ore)
Cypress (where ancient copper artifacts were
discovered)
Pierre and Marie Curie
“hard to get at”
town in Sweden
Europe
physicist
flow or flux (same root as flume, flow, float, fluent,
flush, flute, etc.)
France
chemist's name
France (called Gaul by the Romans because the
inhabitants were Gaelic speaking, probably Celts in
the Brittany region)
Ge
Au
L
L
A/Sax
L
Gr
L
Gr
L
Gr
L
A/Sax
L
Gr
Germania
aurum
gold
Hafnia
helios
Holmia
hydro + genes
indicum
iodes
iris
iron
ferrum
kryptos
Gr
A/Sax
L
Gr
L
Gr
L
It
Rus
L
Gr
Gr
Gr
Gr
L
Ger
Swiss
lanthanein
lead
plumbum
lithos
Lutetia
Magnesia
magnes carneus
manganese
Mendeleev
Mercurius
hydrarguros
molybdos
neos + didymos
neos
Neptunus
nickel
kupfernickel
Nb
Gr
Niobe
N
No
Os
O
Pa
L
Swiss
Gr
Gr
L
Ger
Gr
Sp
L
nitro + genes
Alfred Nobel
osme
oxys + genes
Pallas
Peter Pallas
phosphoros
platina
Pluto
Hf
He
Ho
H
In
I
Ir
Fe
Kr
La
Pb
Li
Lu
Mg
Mn
Md
Hg
Mo
Nd
Ne
Np
Ni
P
Pt
Pu
Germany
“shining dawn”
gold
Copenhagen
the sun
Stockholm
'water forming' (see endpage)
indigo spectrum
violet
rainbow
iron
iron (see end page)
hidden - same root as Crypt (where to hide corpses)
and cryptology (the study of codes)
“to lie hidden”
lead
lead (plumber, plumbline)
stone (lithosphere, neolithic)
ancient name of Paris
district of Thessaly
white earth, literally flesh magnet
corrupt form of magnesia
Dmitri Mendeleev, scientist
planet and god
“silver water”
lead
“new twin”
“new”
planet and god
Satan or Old Nick
Old Nick's, Satan's, or false copper (some believe Old
Nick and St Nick, to be the same person. Rearrange
Satan and get Santa. Why does he wear a RED suit?
hmmm.)
daughter of Tantalus who turned to stone mourning
her children
“niter forming” (saltpeter)
invented dynamite and endowed Nobel foundation
odor
“acid forming” (non-metal oxides in H2O form acids)
named for a planetoid and goddess of wisdom
naturalist
“light bearing,” ancient name for planet Venus
“little silver”
god and planet
Po
K
Pr
Pol
L
Arabic
A/Sax
L
Gr
Pm
Pa
Ra
Rn
Re
Rh
Rb
Ru
Sm
Sc
Se
Si
Ag
Gr
Gr
L
L
L
Gr
L
L
L
L
Gr
L
L
Poland
kallium
al-kali
potash
potassa
prasinos
+ didymos
Prometheus
protos
radius
rad(ium) + on
Rhenus
rhodos
rubidius
Ruthenia
samarski
Scandia
selene
silex, silicis
argentum
Ta
A/Sax
L
Scotch
Sanskrit
L
Gr
seolfur, siolfur
sodanum
Strontium
sulvere
sulphurium
Tantalus
Tc
Te
Tl
Th
Tm
Ti
L
Gr
Gr
Norse
L
L
technetos
tellus
thallos
Thor
Thule
titans
W
Ger
Sanskrit
Swed
L
Norse
Gr
wolf +
Rama
tung + sten
Uranus
Vanadis
xenon
Na
Sr
S
U
V
Xe
homeland of Curies
arabic al-kali
alkaline (basic) (metal oxides in H2O form bases)
from pot ashes
potassium monoxide
“green”
“twin”
the guy who stole fire from heaven
first
ray
“inert gas from radium”
Rhine river (1928: $10K/g, 1930: $ 3 /g (ha ha))
rose
dark red
town in the Ukraine
“a russian”
roman scandinavia
moon goddess
flint
silver (Argentina was named because of a mountain
with extremely high amounts of high grade silver ore.
This mountain gave Spain the riches that allowed it to
be a world power for so long)
silver
ancient headache remedy (see endpage)
ancient Scot town
sulfur (see endpage)
sulfur
the guy who reached for water in Hades (When he
bent down, the water receded. When he reached up
for a fig, the tree grew out of reach. Root of the word
"tantalize")
artificial
earth
green shoot or twig
god of war
earliest name for scandinavia
first sons of the earth (Giants, the 'parents' of the
Greco-Roman gods, also root word of Titanic)
wolf god (vague)
“heavy stone”
god and planet
fertility goddess
stranger (as in xenophobic)
Y
Zn
Zr
Swedish Ytterby
Ger
zinke
Syriac zargono
(Aramaic)
village in Sweden
“prong,” because it's jagged in the furnace
“gold color” or “gold like”
EXTRAS
Fe
ME
OE
iren
iren
isern, isen
Gothic isarna
EC
isarna
Illyrian eisarna
Indo-Eu. eis-
genes Gr
gen
Old English
(chiefly poetic)
Gothic
Early Celtic
by way of Illyrian
Indo-European
“to move vigorously; strong, holy” probably
originally in the sense of “the strong metal” in
contrast to the softer bronze.
as a root means to produce. GENerate, proGENy,
GENeration, GENes, GENetics, GENious...
SODIUM comes from the Latin sodanum. Sodanum was an ancient headache remedy.
Coca-Cola was originally sold as a medicinal "pick-me-up" (of course, that was when it
had cocaine in it). This was why it was a "soda." As the drink evolved, the cocaine was
replaced by caffeine, and the taste and marketing refined. It has retained the name "soda,"
as well as the "have a coke and a smile" image. If you went back to 1889 and asked for a
"soda," they would send you to a drug store where the clerk would find out which specific
soda your condition dictated. This is probably also why soda fountains so logically went
in pharmacies.
SANSKRIT - the similarities between Sanskrit, Latin, and Greek were first noticed in the
late 1800's and led to the idea of tracing languages back to diverging points. All three of
these came from an ancient language called "Indo-European"