40. Zirconium - Elementymology & Elements Multidict

Elementymology & Elements Multidict

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40
Zirconium
Zirkonium – Zirkonium – Zirconium – Circonio – ジルコニウム – Цирконий – 鋯
Zr
Multilingual dictionary

Indo-European
Zirconium Latin

— Germanic
Sirkonium Afrikaans
Zirkonium Danish
Zirkonium German
Zirconium English
Zirkon Faroese
Zirkonium Frisian (West)
Sirkon Icelandic
Zirkonium Luxembourgish
Zirkonium Dutch
Zirkonium Norwegian
Zirkonium Swedish

— Italic
Zirconio Aragonese
Zirconiumu Aromanian
Circoniu Asturian
Zirconi Catalan
Circonio Spanish
Zirconium French
Zirconi Friulian
Circonio Galician
Zirconio Italian
Zircòni Lombard
Zircòni Occitan
Zircónio Portuguese
Zirconiu Romanian - Moldovan

— Slavic
Цирконий [Cirkonij] Bulgarian
Cirkonij[um] Bosnian
Цырконій [cyrkonij] Belarusian
Zirkonium Czech
Cirkonij Croatian
Cyrkón Kashubian
Циркониум [Cirkonium] Macedonian
Cyrkon Polish
Цирконий [Cirkonij] Russian
Zirkón Slovak
Cirkonij Slovenian
Цирконијум [Cirkonijum] Serbian
Цирконій [cyrkonij] Ukrainian

— Baltic
Cirkonis Lithuanian
Cirkonijs Latvian
Cėrkuonis Samogitian

— Celtic
Zirkoniom Breton
Zirconiwm Welsh
Siorcóiniam Gaelic (Irish)
Siorcòiniam Gaelic (Scottish)
Shirkonium Gaelic (Manx)
Zerconyum Cornish

— Other Indo-European
Ζιρκονιο [zirkonio] Greek
Ցիրկոնիում [ts'irkonium] Armenian
Zirkonium[i] Albanian

— Indo-Iranian/Iranian
Zîrkonyûm Kurdish
Цирконий [cirkonij] Ossetian
Сирконий [Sirkoni'] Tajik

— Indo-Iranian/Indo-Aryan
জিরকোনিয়াম [jirakoniẏāma] Bengali
زیرکونیم [zyrkwnym] Persian
ઝરકોનિયમનો [jharkoniyamano] Gujarati
जर्कोनियम [jarkoniyama] Hindi

Finno-Ugric
Tsirkoonium Estonian
Zirkonium Finnish
Cirkónium Hungarian
Цирконий [Cirkonij] Komi
Цирконий [Cirkonij] Mari
Циркони [cirkoni] Moksha
Tsirkoonium Võro

Altaic
Sirkonium Azerbaijani
Циркони [Cirkoni] Chuvash
Цирконий [cirkonij] Kazakh
Цирконий [Cirkonij] Kyrgyz
Циркони [cirkoni] Mongolian
Zirkonyum Turkish
سىركونىي [sirkoniy] Uyghur
Sirkoniy Uzbek

Other (Europe)
Zirkonioa Basque
ცირკონიუმი [c'irkoniumi] Georgian

Afro-Asiatic
زيركونيوم [zarkūniyūm] Arabic
זירקוניום [zirkonium] Hebrew
Żirkonju[m] Maltese

Sino-Tibetan
Ko (鋯) Hakka
ジルコニウム [jirukoniumu] Japanese
지르코늄 [jireukonyum] Korean
เซอร์โคเนียม [soekhōniam] Thai
Ziriconi Vietnamese
[gao4 / go3] Chinese

Malayo-Polynesian
Circonyo Cebuano
Zirkonium Indonesian
Zirconium Māori
Zirkonium Malay

Other Asiatic
സിര്‍കോണിയം [sirkōṇiyam] Malayalam
செர்கோனியம் [cerkōniyam] Tamil

Africa
Zikonu Lingala
Sirconiamo Sesotho
Zirikoni Swahili

North-America
Circonio Nahuatl

South-America
Sirkonyu Quechua

Creole
Srakonimi Sranan Tongo

Artificial
Zirkonio Esperanto

New names
Zircion Atomic Elements
Reactrium Dorseyville
memory peg

Gray-white metal
melting point 1852 °C; 3366 °F
boiling point 4377 °C; 7911 °F
density 6.51 g/cc; 406.16 pounds/cubic foot
1789 Martin Heinrich Klaproth, Germany (oxide)
1824 Jöns Jakob Berzelius, Sweden (metal)
zargûn = gold colour (Persian)
the metal named by Davy in 1808

History & Etymology

The semiprecious gemstone Zircon comes in a variety of colors from blue, yellow, green, brown, orange, red and occasionally purple. It is transparent and can have cat's eye in rare instances. The various forms of zircon have been known as gemstones since ancient times. During the middle ages zircon was thought to induce sleep, promote riches, honor and wisdom; drive away plagues and evil spirits. The Hindus described the Kalpa Tree a symbolic offering to early gods, as being made of glowing precious stones with zircon leaves.
The word Zircon comes from Persian zargûn (literally "gold colour"); in Arabic the "k" was substituted for "g": zarkûn > zircon. It describes one of the colours of the gemstone (Zr(SiO)4). Also other precious stones such as jacinth (or hyacinth), and jargon containing Zirconium are widely distributed and known by ancients.

Zircon was not known to contain a new element until Martin Heinrich Klaproth (1743-1817), in 1789, analyzed a jargon from Ceylon and found a new earth, jargonia or zirconia ("Zirkonerde", ZrO2) (note), which Abraham Gottlob Werner (1749-1817), geologist at Freiberg Mining Academy, named zircon (silex circonius).

Klaproth wrote (note):

Was ist dieses nun für eine Erde? Kann ich solche für eine bisher ungekannte, selbständige, einfache Erde halten? In so fern mir nicht bewußt ist, ob sich eine oder andere der bisher bekannten fünf einfachen Erden künstlich so umändern lasse, daß sie die nemlichen Erscheinungen und Verhältnisse, wie diese Erde aus dem Zirkon, gewährte, glaube ich mich dazu wohl berechtigt, und lege selbiger, bis dahin, daß man sie vielleicht in mehrern Steinarten antreffen, und anderweitige Eigenschaften, welche eine angemessenere Benennung veranlassen mögten, an ihr kennen lernen wird, den Namen Zirkonerde (Terra circonia) bey.
Translation (more or less):
What is this for an earth? May I assume it for an up to now unknown, independent, simple earth? Insomuch I am not aware of, that one or another of the up to now known five simple earths can be artificially altered, so that it shows the appearance and relations as this earth from the zircon, I consider myself entitled to, until it is perhaps found in other kinds of stones, with further properties, giving cause to a more appropriate name, to give it the name zirkon earth (zirkonia).

Later, Klaproth found his "Zirkonerde" also in a jacinth (or hyacinth) from Ceylon, and considered the name "Hyacintherde" more appropriate (note). This name is found in some of the later literature.

In 1808, Sir Humphry Davy (1778-1829) did experiments for the decomposition of alumine, silex, zircone, and glucine. He failed to isolate the metals in these, as he reported in his paper for the Royal Society of London on 30 June 1808, but he suggested names for the metals (note):


Cf. Silicium, Aluminium, and Beryllium ("Glucium")

Jöns Jakob Berzelius finally obtained the metal in 1824 (note).

Chemistianity 1873
SEYAN
ZIRCONIUM, Silicon's friendly metal,
In crystallized state forms hard brittle scales
Like Antimony for colour and lustre;
It fires at a red heat in Chlorine Gas.
J. Carrington Sellars, Chemistianity, 1873, p. 154

Further reading
  • Mary Elvira Weeks, Discovery of the Elements, comp. rev. by Henry M. Leicester (Easton, Pa.: Journal of Chemical Education, 1968), pp. 517-520.
  • Zirkonium. Gmelins Handbuch der anorganische Chemie, 8. Aufl.; System-Nummer 42 (1958).


Sources Index of Persons Index of Alleged Elements