How Elements Get Their Names

Saif Uddin
Teacher, BMARPC
It is said that, Education is the backbone of the nation. To me as a chemistry student cum
teacher, I strongly believe as well as most of the chemists believe that, ‘Periodic Table is the
backbone of the Chemistry’. If someone wants to know about chemistry he must have to know
first ‘The Periodic Table of the Elements’. Actually the learning of the basic chemistry begins with
the Periodic Table. There are about 118 elements in the table so far. Russian scientist Dmitri
Mendeleev was first introduced the Periodic Table in 1869. I would like to tell you that
discovering of new element is a continuing process.

People generally have idea about water and water is connected with human life. We know water
is made up of Hydrogen and Oxygen that has a chemical formula H 2O. Hydrogen, Carbon and
Oxygen have their general name but of the 118 elements, some of the elements are named after
their Latin origin, Color, Mythological names, Planets, Places, Scientists names and so on.

In my writings, I would like to let you know that how the elements get their names in the table.
Copper, Gold, Iron are antiquity elements but the first element of the periodic table was
discovered in 1669 which is Phosphorous. Most of the elements are named from their English
name like Hydrogen (H), Carbon (C), Nitrogen (N), Sulphur(S) etc. Elements like Sodium
(Natrium,Na), Potassium (Kallium,K), Copper (Cuprum,Cu) , Lead (Plumbum,Pb),Tin (Stannum,Sn)
etc comes from their Latin name. There is an important role of scientists for discovering the
elements. So that, more than 18 elements are named after their names such as 62(Sm) Vassili
Samarsky-Bykhovets(Samarium), 64(Gd) Gadolin, 95(Am) Amerigo Vespucci which is also named
after the country USA, 96(Cm) Pierre & Marie curie, 99(Es) Albert Einstein, 100(Fm) Enrico Fermi,
101(Md) Mendeleev, 102(No) Alferd Nobel which is Nobelium,107(Bh) Neils Bohr, 104(Rf)
Rutherford and so on. 118(Og) Yuri Oganessian which is the last element name Oganesson.

Moreover, some elements are named after Celestial bodies that mean astronomical objects.
Helium, first member of the Noble gas is named after “Helios” the Greek word means the ‘Sun’.
Cerium (Ce) from Greek word ‘Ceres’ the first asteroid to be discovered. Mercury (Hg), a planet
also Hydrogyrum, Neptunium (Np), Plutonium (Pu), Uranium (U). Selenium (Se) comes from
‘Selene’ the Greek name for the ‘Moon’. Tellurium (Te) comes from ‘Tellus’ latin name for the
‘Earth’. Titanium (Ti) comes from Greek name “Titans” which means “first sons on Earth”.
Thorium (Th) named after “Thor” the mythological Scandinavian ‘god of war’. Yttrium(Y),
Terbium (Tb), Erbium(Er) and Ytterbium (Yb) are all named for the Swedish village of Ytterby.
Interesting is that all the metals found as ores in the village. Scandium (Sc) comes from the Latin
word ‘Scandinavia’. Tungsten (W), which is comes from German word ‘Wolfram’. Some of the
elements are named after colour such as Cesium (Cs) Latin ‘Caesius’ meaning Sky blue, Chlorine
(Cl) Greek ‘Chloros’ meaning greenish-yellow, Rubidium(Rb) Latin ‘Ribidus’ meaning deepest red.

Finally the periodic table is said to be the heart of chemistry.