List of chemical element name etymologies

This article lists the etymology of chemical elements of the periodic table.

History

Throughout the history of chemistry, many chemical elements have been discovered. In the 19th century, Dmitri Mendeleev formulated the periodic table, a table of elements which describes their structure. Because elements have been discovered at various times and places, from antiquity through the present day, their names have derived from several languages and cultures.

Named after places

Of the 118 known elements, 41 have names associated with, or specifically named after, places around the world or among astronomical objects. Of these, 32 have names tied to the places on Earth, and the other nine are named after Solar System objects; helium and selenium after the Sun and Moon; mercury (indirectly), tellurium, uranium and neptunium after the planets Mercury, Earth, Uranus and Neptune; plutonium and cerium after the dwarf planets Pluto and Ceres, both considered planets when the elements were named; and palladium after the asteroid Pallas.

Named after people

Nineteen elements are connected with the names of twenty people (as curium honours both Marie and Pierre Curie). Of these, only gadolinium and samarium occur in nature; the rest are synthetic. Fifteen elements were named after scientists; four other have indirect connection to the names of non-scientists. Only Glenn T. Seaborg and Yuri Oganessian were honoured during their lifetime by having elements named after them, and Oganessian is the only one still living.