Glossary

of

Archaic Chemical Terms

Part V (S-Z)

Go to Part I (A-B), Part II (C-F), Part III (G-L), or Part IV (M-R).


saccharum saturni: sugar of lead; see also Saturn

sal ...

salt ... Saturn: In astrological and alchemical thought, the seven heavenly bodies known to the ancients were associated with seven metals also known in antiquity. Saturn was associated with lead (plumbum)

Scheele's green: an acidic copper(II) arsenite, CuHAsO3, named for Carl Wilhelm Scheele.

Schlippe's salt: sodium sulfantimonate, Na3SbS4.9H2O, named for Carl Friedrich von Schlippe.

Schšllkopf's acid: apparently, Schšllkopf had three. 1-naphthol-4,8-disulfonic acid, 1-naphthylamine-4,8-disulfonic acid, and 1-naphthylamine-8-sulfonic acid. (Click here for structures.)

scruple: See apothecary measures.

Seignette's salt: see rochelle salt. Peter Seignette was an apothecary at Rochelle.

Seven planets, seven metals: In astrological and alchemical thought, the seven heavenly bodies known to the ancients were associated with seven metals also known in antiquity. The associations were:
Sun (Sol)gold (aurum)
Mercurymercury (quicksilver, hydrargyrum)
Venuscopper (cuprum)
Moon (Luna)silver (argentum)
Marsiron (ferrum)
Jupitertin (stannum)
Saturnlead (plumbum)

siliceous earth: silicon dioxide, SiO2. [Lavoisier, Scheele]

silver ...

soda: sodium carbonate, Na2CO3 (washing soda), or sodium hydrogen carbonate, NaHCO3 (baking soda) [Dalton, Lavoisier, Prout, Rayleigh]. Caustic soda was sodium hydroxide, NaOH. [Mendeleev]. See also fossil alkali, marine alkali, common mineral alkali.

sorrel salt: potassium hydrogen oxalate, KHC2O4 (sal acetosella, salt of lemon)

Spanish white: bismuth oxychloride, BiOCl, or oxynitrate, BiONO3

spirit (spiritus): an essence or extract that can be prepared from another substance as by distillation. If not specified, spirits refer to alcohol (ethanol).

stannum glaciale: bismuth (literally glacial tin)

sugar of lead (saccharum saturni: lead acetate, Pb(CH3CO)2.3H2O

sulphovinic acid: ethyl hydrogen sulfate, C2H5.HSO4, the product of the reaction of sulfuric acid with ethyl alcohol

sulphuret: sulfide (hepar). [Berzelius, Dalton, T. Thomson]

sulphuretted: combined with or impregnated with sulfur. [Frankland]

sulphuretted hydrogen: hydrogen sulfide, H2S (hepatic air). [Dalton, Gay-Lussac, Prout, T. Thomson et al.]

sulphuric acid: formerly meant sulfur trioxide, SO3. [Dalton, Gay-Lussac, Lavoisier, Prout, T. Thomson et al.]

sulphurous acid or sulphurous gas: formerly meant sulfur dioxide, SO2. [Avogadro, Gay-Lussac, Lavoisier, Prout, T. Thomson, et al.]

Sun (Sol): In astrological and alchemical thought, the seven heavenly bodies known to the ancients were associated with seven metals also known in antiquity. The sun was associated with gold (aurum).

sweet salt: sodium chlorite, NaClO2.

Sylvius's febrifuge salt: potassium chloride, KCl; named for the iatrochemist Franciscus Sylvius

tartar: (tartar of wine) potassium hydrogen tartrate, KHC4H4O6 [Stahl]

tectum argenti: bismuth (construed as silver not completely formed in the earth)

terra ...: earth

Thénard's blue: blue cobalt aluminate, Co(AlO2)2, named for Louis-Jacques Thénard.

thorium ... See table.

thymol blue: thymolsulphonphthalein, C27H30O5S, an acid-base indicator that changes from pink to yellow as the pH is raised through 2.2 and then to blue as the pH is raised through 8.8

trona: natural sodium carbonate/bicarbonate, Na2CO3.NaHCO3.2H2O

Turnbull's blue: ferroferricyanide, Fe3[Fe(CN)6]2, also known as insoluble Prussian blue

turbith mineral (or turpeth): basic sulfate of mercury, HgSO4.2HgO. [Cavendish, Lavoisier, Priestley]

tyrian purple: 6,6'-dibromoindigotin, C16H8N2O2Br2, an important dye of the ancient Mediterranean.

uranium ... See table.

urinous ... vegetable alkali: usually crude or purified potassium carbonate, K2CO3 (pearl ash), sometimes specified as mild vegetable alkali or fixed vegetable alkali. Caustic vegetable alkali is potassium hydroxide. [Davy]

Venus: In astrological and alchemical thought, the seven heavenly bodies known to the ancients were associated with seven metals also known in antiquity. Venus was associated with copper (cuprum).

virginium (Vi or Vm): a name proposed for element 87 (francium) in a report of detection of the element whose validity was ultimately not recognized.

verdigris: basic copper acetate, used as a pigment from green to blue. Literally "green of Greece" in French; however, it was also called Spanish green. blue verdigris is copper(II) acetate, Cu(C2H3O2)2.H2O.

vermilion: mercury(II) sulfide, HgS, a red pigment; also known as cinnabar. (See minium.)

vis viva: energy. The law of conservation of energy was originally phrased in terms of vis viva [Clausius, Joule, Kelvin, Mayer]

vitamin (or sometimes vitamine, from "vital amine" [Funk]): an organic substance essential in small quantities to the normal health of an animal. Vitamins must typically be supplied to the animal through diet. The chemical names for some vitamins follow. For structures, see this tutorial at Washington University St. Louis..

vitriol: a sulfate, especially iron sulfate; see copperas. volatile alkali: aqueous ammonia, NH3; see alkaline air, spirit of hartshorn. Concrete volatile alkali refers to ammonium carbonate, (NH4)2CO3. [Black, Cavendish, Lavoisier, Scheele, et al.]

water glass (also soluble glass): a hydrated sodium silicate, Na2Si4O9.xH2O, either an amorphous solid or in thick aqueous solution, used as a binder or adhesive.

wolfram: a name of Germanic origin originally applied to a native iron manganese tungstate and later to the element tungsten, hence the symbol W.

xylenol blue: 1,4-dimethyl-5-hydroxybenzenesulfonphthalein, an acid-base indicator that changes from red to yellow as the pH is raised through 2 and then to blue as the pH is raised through 8.8.


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