Elementymology & Elements Multidict

memory peg	Radioactive metal melting point 1750 °C; 3182 °F boiling point ~4790 °C; ~8654 °F density 11.72 g/cc; 731.66 pounds/cubic foot
1829 Jöns Jakob Berzelius, Sweden
Thor, Scandinavian god of war

In 1815, the Swedish chemist Jöns Jakob Berzelius (1779-1848) obtained a material which he regarded as a new earth. He assigned this to a new oxide and the corresponding metal name was intended to honor Thor, the ancient Scandinavian god of thunder (note). However, in 1824, it turned out that this supposedly new earth was Yttrium phosphate.

Four years later, Reverend Hans Morten Thrane Esmark (1801-1882) discovered a black mineral on the island of Løvø (Finsholm) near Brevik, Norway. "Han kaldte det op efter Guden Thor" and gave a sample of this material to his father Jens Esmark, a leading Norwegian old-earth geology professor. Professor Esmark was unable to identify it as any known mineral, so he in turn sent a specimen to Berzelius for examination. A chemical analysis of this mineral by Berzelius demonstrated that it contained almost 60% of a new earth which he reported as distinct from all others known. It appears that, in naming this new oxide thoria and the mineral which it was obtained thorite (ThSiO₄), Berzelius fully restores the dignity of Thor from the earlier near humiliation.

The discovery of Thorium was announced by Berzelius in a publication in 1829 (note).

In Orangite, a mineral very similar to Thorite, found in Langesundfjord near Brevik, C. Bergemann thought in 1851 to have found a new element, different from Thorium. He named it Donarium, after the German god of war (note). Shortly afterwards was found the Orangite was identical with Thorite and Donarium identical with Thorium.

John and Gordon Marks suggested in 1994 the symbol Θ (note).

In 1862 J.F. Bahr described a new metal oxide from a mineral Wasite found on the island of Rösholm near Stockholm. He named the new element Wasium (note). Just as the mineral, named after Wasa, or Vasa, the name of a former royal family of Sweden. Within a year Bahr himself rejected his discovery: it was probably Thorium.

In The Tech, the newspaper of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, of 21 April 1908 was announced that "Dr. Baskerville, of the University of North Carolina, (...) has resolved thorium into two new elements. One of these he has named Carolinium, after the State; the other Berzelium, in honor of the great Swedish chemist." (note).

Most surviving stories relating to Germanic mythology either mention Thor or focus on Thor's exploits. Thor was a much revered god of the ancient Germanic peoples from at least the earliest surviving written accounts of the indigenous Germanic tribes to over a thousand years later in the late Viking Age.

Thor was appealed to for protection on numerous objects found from various Germanic tribes. Miniature replicas of Mjöllnir, the weapon of Thor, became a defiant symbol of Norse paganism during the Christianization of Scandinavia (note).

• Mary Elvira Weeks, Discovery of the Elements, comp. rev. by Henry M. Leicester (Easton, Pa.: Journal of Chemical Education, 1968), pp. 532-535.
• Winfried Kölzer, Radioaktivität, Strahlenexposition, Strahlenwirkung. Bonn: Informationskreis Kernenergie, 2000 (PDF file on-line).
• Lauri Niinistö, "Swedish Contributions to the Discovery of Elements: Part 2: The Work of Berzelius." ERES Newsletter, vol. 10, no. 1 (31 August 1999). (on-line).
• Thorium und Isotope. Gmelins Handbuch der anorganische Chemie, 8. Aufl.; System-Nummer 44 (1955).