Elementymology & Elements Multidict

memory peg	Deep gray metal which takes on a blue-purple hue as it oxidizes melting point 2468 °C; 4474 °F boiling point 4742 °C; 8568 °F density 8.57 g/cc; 535.01 pounds/cubic foot
1801 Charles Hatchett, England
Νιοβη (Niobe), daughter of Tantalus (Greek mythology) named by Heinrich Rose, 1844. In 1950 accepted by IUPAC,against Columbium.

Columbium 1801

In 1801, Charles Hatchett (1765-1847) found an unknown ore at the time during the analysis of some Chromium minerals, which had lain in the British Museum since 1753. The minerals were sent to England by the grandson of John Winthrop (1609-1676), the first governor of Connecticut and alchemist, manufacturing chemist, physician, and rock collector. He called this mineral "columbite" and the corresponding element Columbium, because it had been discovered in an American mineral.

One year later, in 1802, Anders Gustaf Ekeberg (1767-1813) discovered a new element in Finnish minerals similar to the columbite and named it Tantalum. However, in 1809 William Hyde Wollaston (1766-1828) claimed to have shown Columbium and Tantalum were identical, discrediting Ekeberg's claim.

Niobium 1844, and several alleged elements discovered in Tantalite

• Niobium and Pelopium, 1844. Heinrich Rose (1795–1864), analyzing in a sample of columbite (or tantalite) of Bodenmais (Bavaria), showed that Wollaston's claims were false and that not only the element Tantalum was there, but also two new elements which he named after two children of Tantalus: Niobium (after Niobe, goddess of the tears) and Pelopium (after Pelops) (note).
  
  
  
• Ilmenium, 1846. R. Hermann (1805-1879) had found in a sample of samarskite the new metal Ilmenium (cf. Samarium).
• Dianium, 1860. The German mineralogist Franz von Kobell (1803-1882) discovered a new element in Tantalite, which he named Dianium, after Diana, goddess of hunting. The American magazine The Living age commented thus:

  "Von Kobell, the distinguished Professor of Mineralogy at the University of Munich, has discovered the acid of a new metal in the somewhat rare mineral from Tammela, in Finland, hitherto known as Tantalite. Von Kobell, following usage, has christened his new substance after an ancient divinity, and, being himself addicted to the noblest of Alpine sports, has carried the name of the «chaste huntress» into chemistry. Dianic acid is the name of the acid, and Dianium must be the designation of its metallic base" (note).

• Neptunium, 1877. Hermann, making an extended investigation on the Tantalum group of metals in columbite from Haddam, Conn., established not only the existence of Ilmenium as a distinct element, but has also discovered new metal in this group, Neptunium (note).

All these discoveries of new elements within a few years caused some comments of unbelief. That of the science editor of the American magazine the Manufacturer and builder, published July 1880, is also on the Rare Earths page.

Only two elements

The difference between Tantalum and Niobium was unequivocally made by Sainte-Claire Deville and Louis J. Troost (1825-1911), who determined the formulas of some of its compounds. The Columbium of Hatchett was probably a mixture of these two elements, although the term has been used later on as synonymous of Niobium.

Element #41 was therefore long time known as Niobium as well as Columbium. To end this confusion, at the 15th Conference of the Union of Chemistry in Amsterdam in 1949 the name Niobium was chosen for element #41 and a year later this name was accepted by the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry, despite the chronological precedence of the name Columbium. The latter name is still sometimes used in US industry.

Νιοβη [Niobe], daughter of Tantalus, is one of the more tragic figures in Greek myth. She had had fourteen children (the Niobids), and boasted over her progenitive superiority to the Titan Leto, who had only two children (Apollo and Artemis). To punish Niobe for her arrogance, Apollo and Artemis killed her children. She begged the gods to spare her youngest daughter, but they refused. As the final arrow fatally struck the child, Niobe refused to utter a sound and was metamorphosed into a rock, down which tears trickled silently. This stone, described by Pausanias as a natural formation with the appearance of a woman, is located on Mount Sipylus and continues to weep when the snow melts over it. She became the symbol of eternal mourning. Carved on a rock cliff on Mt Sipylus is the fading image of a female that the Greeks claim is Niobe (it was probably Cybele, the great mother-goddess of Asia Minor originally). Composed of porous limestone, the stone appears to weep as the water after a rain seeps through it (Encyclopedia Mythica).

• Mary Elvira Weeks, Discovery of the Elements, comp. rev. by Henry M. Leicester (Easton, Pa.: Journal of Chemical Education, 1968), pp. 323-344.
• Niob. Gmelins Handbuch der anorganische Chemie, 8. Aufl.; System-Nummer 49 (1969).