Editing Aluminium (section)

== Etymology ==
The names ''aluminium'' and ''aluminum'' are derived from the word ''alumine'', an obsolete term for ''alumina'',{{efn|The spelling ''alumine'' comes from French, whereas the spelling ''alumina'' comes from Latin.<ref>{{cite book|last=Black|first=J.|url=http://archive.org/details/2543060RX2.nlm.nih.gov|title=Lectures on the elements of chemistry: delivered in the University of Edinburgh|date=1806|publisher=Graves, B.|page=291|volume=2}}
{{blockquote|The French chemists have given a new name to this pure earth; alumine in French, and alumina in Latin. I confess I do not like this alumina.}}</ref>}} the primary naturally occurring [[oxide of aluminium]].<ref name="OEDaluminium-origin">{{cite web |website=Oxford English Dictionary, third edition |title=aluminium, n. |url=https://www.oed.com/view/Entry/5889 |publisher=Oxford University Press  |date=December 2011 |access-date=30 December 2020|archive-date=11 June 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210611060750/https://www.oed.com/start;jsessionid=103D1FF8ECD2A058B7F6241C7F97B88D?authRejection=true&url=%2Fview%2FEntry%2F5889 |url-status=live }}
{{blockquote|'''Origin:''' Formed within English, by derivation. '''Etymons:''' {{smallcaps|alumine}}''n.'', {{smallcaps|-ium}} ''suffix'', {{smallcaps|aluminum}} ''n.''}}</ref> ''Alumine'' was borrowed from French, which in turn derived it from ''alumen'', the classical Latin name for [[alum]], the mineral from which it was collected.<ref name="OEDalumine">{{cite web |website=Oxford English Dictionary, third edition |title=alumine, n. |url=https://www.oed.com/view/Entry/5880 |publisher=Oxford University Press |date=December 2011 |access-date=30 December 2020 |archive-date=11 June 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210611060739/https://www.oed.com/start;jsessionid=2B8662831CD405D28E3F852F18211FD4?authRejection=true&url=%2Fview%2FEntry%2F5880 |url-status=live }}
{{blockquote|'''Etymology:''' < French ''alumine'' (L. B. Guyton de Morveau 1782, ''Observ. sur la Physique'' '''19''' 378) < classical Latin ''alūmin-'', ''alūmen'' {{smallcaps|alum}} ''n.''<sup>1</sup>, after French ''-ine'' {{smallcaps|-ine}} suffix<sup>4</sup>.}}</ref> The Latin word ''alumen'' stems from the [[Proto-Indo-European language|Proto-Indo-European]] root ''*alu-'' meaning "bitter" or "beer".<ref>{{cite book |last=Pokorny |first=Julius |author-link=Julius Pokorny |title=Indogermanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch |trans-title=Indo-European etymological dictionary |language=de |url=https://indo-european.info/pokorny-etymological-dictionary/whnjs.htm |date=1959 |publisher=A. Francke Verlag |pages=33–34 |entry=alu- (-d-, -t-) |access-date=13 November 2017 |archive-date=23 November 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171123145109/https://indo-european.info/pokorny-etymological-dictionary/whnjs.htm |url-status=live }}</ref>

[[File:The Turner Brass Works ad 1897.jpg|thumb|upright|1897 American advertisement featuring the ''aluminum'' spelling]]

=== Origins ===
British chemist [[Humphry Davy]], who performed a number of experiments aimed to isolate the metal, is credited as the person who named the element. The first name proposed for the metal to be isolated from alum was ''alumium'', which Davy suggested in an 1808 article on his electrochemical research, published in [[Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society]].<ref name="Davy1808">{{Cite journal|last1=Davy|first1=Humphry|date=1808|title=Electro Chemical Researches, on the Decomposition of the Earths; with Observations on the Metals obtained from the alkaline Earths, and on the Amalgam procured from Ammonia|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Kg9GAAAAMAAJ&pg=RA1-PA353|journal=Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society|volume=98|page=353|doi=10.1098/rstl.1808.0023|access-date=10 December 2009|doi-access=free|bibcode=1808RSPT...98..333D|archive-date=15 April 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210415111945/https://books.google.com/books?id=Kg9GAAAAMAAJ&pg=RA1-PA353|url-status=live}}</ref> It appeared that the name was created from the English word ''alum'' and the Latin suffix ''-ium''; but it was customary then to give elements names originating in Latin, so this name was not adopted universally. This name was criticized by contemporary chemists from France, Germany, and Sweden, who insisted the metal should be named for the oxide, alumina, from which it would be isolated.{{sfn|Richards|1896|pp=3–4}} The English name ''alum'' does not come directly from Latin, whereas ''alumine''/''alumina'' comes from the Latin word ''alumen'' (upon [[declension]], ''alumen'' changes to ''alumin-'').

One example was ''Essai sur la Nomenclature chimique'' (July 1811), written in French by a Swedish chemist, [[Jöns Jacob Berzelius]], in which the name ''aluminium'' is given to the element that would be synthesized from alum.<ref name="berzelius">{{cite journal|last=Berzelius|first=J. J.|title=Essai sur la nomenclature chimique|journal=Journal de Physique|volume=73|pages=253–286|year=1811|author-link=Jöns Jakob Berzelius|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=HpfOAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA253|access-date=27 December 2020|archive-date=15 April 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210415120753/https://books.google.com/books?id=HpfOAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA253|url-status=live}}.</ref>{{efn|Davy discovered several other elements, including those he named ''[[sodium]]'' and ''[[potassium]]'', after the English words ''[[Soda lime|soda]]'' and ''[[potash]]''. Berzelius referred to them as to ''natrium'' and ''kalium''. Berzelius's suggestion was expanded in 1814<ref>{{cite journal|last=Berzelius|first=J.|author-link=Jöns Jacob Berzelius|title=Essay on the Cause of Chemical Proportions, and on some Circumstances relating to them: together with a short and easy Method of expressing them|editor-last=Thomson|editor-first=Th.|editor-link=Thomas Thomson (chemist)|year=1814|publisher=Baldwin, R.|journal=[[Annals of Philosophy]]|volume=III|pages=51–62|url=https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/item/54032#page/5/mode/1up|access-date=13 December 2014|archive-date=15 July 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140715120636/http://biodiversitylibrary.org/item/54032#page/5/mode/1up|url-status=live}}</ref> with his proposed system of one or two-letter [[chemical symbol]]s, which are used up to the present day; sodium and potassium have the symbols ''Na'' and ''K'', respectively, after their Latin names.}} (Another article in the same journal issue also refers to the metal whose oxide is the basis of [[sapphire]], i.e. the same metal, as to ''aluminium''.)<ref>{{cite journal|last=Delaméntherie|first=J.-C.|title=Leçonse de minéralogie. Données au collége de France|journal=Journal de Physique|volume=73|pages=469–470|year=1811|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=HpfOAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA470|access-date=27 December 2020|archive-date=15 April 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210415114959/https://books.google.com/books?id=HpfOAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA470|url-status=live}}.</ref> A January 1811 summary of one of Davy's lectures at the [[Royal Society]] mentioned the name ''aluminium'' as a possibility.<ref>{{Cite journal|date=January 1811|title=Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London. For the Year 1810. — Part I|journal=The Critical Review: Or, Annals of Literature|series=The Third|volume=XXII|pages=9|hdl=2027/chi.36013662?urlappend=%3Bseq=17|language=en}}{{blockquote|Potassium, acting upon alumine and glucine, produces pyrophoric substances of a dark grey colour, which burnt, throwing off brilliant sparks, and leaving behind alkali and earth, and which, when thrown into water, decomposed it with great violence. The result of this experiment is not wholly decisive as to the existence of what might be called ''aluminium'' and ''glucinium''}}</ref> The next year, Davy published a chemistry textbook in which he used the spelling ''aluminum''.<ref name="Davy1812">{{cite book|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=YjMwAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA201|title=Elements of Chemical Philosophy: Part 1|last=Davy|first=Humphry|publisher=Bradford and Inskeep|year=1812|volume=1|page=201|chapter=Of metals; their primary compositions with other uncompounded bodies, and with each other|author-link=Humphry Davy|access-date=4 March 2020|archive-date=14 March 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200314113620/https://books.google.com/books?id=YjMwAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA201|url-status=live}}</ref> Both spellings have coexisted since. Their usage is currently regional: ''aluminum'' dominates in the United States and [[Canada]]; ''aluminium'' is prevalent in the rest of the English-speaking world.<ref name="OEDaluminium-usage">{{cite web
|website=Oxford English Dictionary, third edition
|title=aluminium, n.
|url=https://www.oed.com/view/Entry/5889
|publisher=Oxford University Press|date=December 2011|access-date=30 December 2020
|archive-date=11 June 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210611060736/https://www.oed.com/start;jsessionid=7486FA56257A57791FB5DF1C726BAE1F?authRejection=true&url=%2Fview%2FEntry%2F5889|url-status=live}}
{{blockquote|{{smallcaps|aluminium}} ''n.'' coexisted with its synonym {{smallcaps|aluminum}} ''n.'' throughout the 19th cent. From the beginning of the 20th cent., ''aluminum'' gradually became the predominant form in North America; it was adopted as the official name of the metal in the United States by the American Chemical Society in 1925. Elsewhere, ''aluminum'' was gradually superseded by ''aluminium'', which was accepted as international standard by IUPAC in 1990.}}</ref>

=== Spelling ===
In 1812, British scientist [[Thomas Young (scientist)|Thomas Young]]<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.rc.umd.edu/reference/qr/index/15.html#contents|title=Quarterly Review Archive|last1=Cutmore|first1=Jonathan|website=Romantic Circles|publisher=University of Maryland|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170301094017/http://www.rc.umd.edu/reference/qr/index/15.html|archive-date=1 March 2017|url-status=live|date=February 2005|access-date=28 February 2017}}</ref> wrote an anonymous review of Davy's book, in which he proposed the name ''aluminium'' instead of ''aluminum'', which he thought had a "less classical sound".<ref>{{Cite journal|last1=Young|first1=Thomas|date=1812|title=Elements of Chemical Philosophy By Sir Humphry Davy|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=uGykjvn032IC&pg=PA72|journal=[[Quarterly Review]]|volume=VIII|issue=15|page=72|isbn=978-0-217-88947-6|id=210|access-date=10 December 2009|archive-date=25 July 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200725043632/https://books.google.com/books?id=uGykjvn032IC&pg=PA72|url-status=live}}</ref> This name persisted: although the ''{{nowrap|-um}}'' spelling was occasionally used in Britain, the American scientific language used ''{{nowrap|-ium}}'' from the start.<ref name="Quinion2005" />

[[Ludwig Wilhelm Gilbert]] had proposed ''Thonerde-metall'', after the German "Thonerde"{{efn|a historic spelling, nowadays spelled "[[wikt:Tonerde#German|Tonerde]]"}} for alumina, in his ''[[Annalen der Physik]]'' but that name never caught on at all even in Germany.<ref name=Richards1891/>  [[Joseph W. Richards]]{{efn|founder and later president of the Electrochemical Society}} in 1891 found just one occurrence of ''argillium'' in Swedish, from the French "argille"{{efn|nowadays spelled "[[wikt:argile#French|argile]]"}} for clay.<ref name=Richards1891/>  The French themselves had used ''aluminium'' from the start.<ref name=Richards1891/> However, in England and Germany Davy's spelling ''aluminum'' was initially used; until German chemist [[Friedrich Wöhler]] published his account of the [[Wöhler process]] in 1827 in which he used the spelling ''aluminium''{{efn|Wöhler had previously used ''aluminium'' in 1824, when translating a paper by [[Jöns Jacob Berzelius]] from Swedish.<ref name=Richards1891/>}}, which caused that spelling's largely wholesale adoption in England and Germany, with the exception of a small number of what Richards characterized as "patriotic" English chemists that were "averse to foreign innovations" who occasionally still used ''aluminum''.<ref name=Richards1891>{{cite journal|journal=Journal of the Franklin Institute|volume=131|issue=3|series=American periodical series, 1800&ndash;1850|publisher=Pergamon Press|date=March 1891|author1-first=Joseph W.|author1-last=Richards|title=The Aluminium Problem|pages=190&ndash;191|doi=10.1016/0016-0032(91)90249-3}}</ref>

Most scientists throughout the world used ''{{nowrap|-ium}}'' in the 19th century;<ref name="OEDaluminium-usage" /> and it was entrenched in several other European languages, such as [[French language|French]], [[German language|German]], and [[Dutch language|Dutch]].{{Efn|Some European languages, like [[Spanish language|Spanish]] or [[Italian language|Italian]], use a different suffix from the Latin ''-um''/''-ium'' to form a name of a metal, some, like [[Polish language|Polish]] or [[Czech language|Czech]], have a different base for the name of the element, and some, like [[Russian language|Russian]] or [[Greek language|Greek]], do not use the [[Latin script]] altogether.|name=|group=}}

In 1828, an American lexicographer, [[Noah Webster]], entered only the ''aluminum'' spelling in his ''[[Webster's Dictionary#First edition 1828|American Dictionary of the English Language]]''.<ref>{{Cite book|url=http://webstersdictionary1828.com/Dictionary/aluminum|title=American Dictionary of the English Language|last=Webster|first=Noah|year=1828|entry=aluminum|author-link=Noah Webster|access-date=13 November 2017|archive-date=13 November 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171113222259/http://webstersdictionary1828.com/Dictionary/aluminum|url-status=live}}</ref> In the 1830s, the ''{{nowrap|-um}}'' spelling gained usage in the United States; by the 1860s, it had become the more common spelling there outside science.<ref name="Quinion2005">{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Js-PbsEjKSQC&pg=PT23|title=Port Out, Starboard Home: The Fascinating Stories We Tell About the words We Use|last=Quinion|first=Michael|publisher=Penguin Books Limited|year=2005|isbn=978-0-14-190904-2|pages=23–24}}</ref> In 1892, Hall used the ''{{nowrap|-um}}'' spelling in his advertising handbill for his new electrolytic method of producing the metal, despite his constant use of the ''{{nowrap|-ium}}'' spelling in all the patents he filed between 1886 and 1903. It is unknown whether this spelling was introduced by mistake or intentionally, but Hall preferred ''aluminum'' since its introduction because it resembled ''[[platinum]]'', the name of a prestigious metal.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Kean|first=S.|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=qy40DwAAQBAJ&q=aluminium+aluminum+hall+typo+spelling&pg=PT120|title=The Disappearing Spoon: And Other True Tales of Rivalry, Adventure, and the History of the World from the Periodic Table of the Elements|date=2018|publisher=Little, Brown Books for Young Readers|isbn=978-0-316-38825-2|pages=<!--the book does not use page numbers-->|language=en|chapter=Elements as money|edition=Young Readers|access-date=14 January 2021|archive-date=15 April 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210415111942/https://books.google.com/books?id=qy40DwAAQBAJ&q=aluminium+aluminum+hall+typo+spelling&pg=PT120|url-status=live}}</ref> By 1890, both spellings had been common in the United States, the ''{{nowrap|-ium}}'' spelling being slightly more common; by 1895, the situation had reversed; by 1900, ''aluminum'' had become twice as common as ''aluminium''; in the next decade, the ''{{nowrap|-um}}'' spelling dominated American usage. In 1925, the [[American Chemical Society]] adopted this spelling.<ref name="OEDaluminium-usage" />

The [[International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry]] (IUPAC) adopted ''aluminium'' as the standard international name for the element in 1990.<ref name="Emsley2011" /> In 1993, they recognized ''aluminum'' as an acceptable variant;<ref name="Emsley2011">{{cite book|last=Emsley|first=John|author-link=John Emsley|title=Nature's Building Blocks: An A–Z Guide to the Elements|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=2EfYXzwPo3UC&pg=PA24|year=2011|publisher=OUP Oxford|isbn=978-0-19-960563-7|pages=24–30|access-date=16 November 2017|archive-date=22 December 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191222070959/https://books.google.com/books?id=2EfYXzwPo3UC&pg=PA24|url-status=live}}</ref> the most recent [[IUPAC nomenclature of inorganic chemistry 2005|2005 edition of the IUPAC nomenclature of inorganic chemistry]] also acknowledges this spelling.<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://www.iupac.org/fileadmin/user_upload/databases/Red_Book_2005.pdf|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141222172055/http://www.iupac.org/fileadmin/user_upload/databases/Red_Book_2005.pdf|url-status=dead|archive-date=22 December 2014|editor1-first=Neil G.|editor1-last=Connelly|editor2-first=Ture|editor2-last=Damhus|title=Nomenclature of inorganic chemistry. IUPAC Recommendations 2005|publisher=[[RSC Publishing]]|year=2005|isbn=978-0-85404-438-2|page=249}}</ref> IUPAC official publications use the ''{{nowrap|-ium}}'' spelling as primary, and they list both where it is appropriate.{{efn|For instance, see the November–December 2013 issue of ''Chemistry International'': in a table of (some) elements, the element is listed as "aluminium (aluminum)".<ref>{{cite journal
|title=Standard Atomic Weights Revised|author=<!--none listed-->|pages=17–18
|url=https://www.iupac.org/publications/ci/2013/3506/nov13.pdf
|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140211093133/http://www.iupac.org/publications/ci/2013/3506/nov13.pdf|url-status=dead|archive-date=11 February 2014
|journal=Chemistry International|volume=35|issue=6|issn=0193-6484}}</ref>}}