Science & TechnologyGreek → English
Ammonia
/əˈmoʊniə/noun
A pungent gas of nitrogen and hydrogen, dissolved in water for cleaning and made by the tonne for fertiliser.
The Greek roots
ἀμμωνιακόν
ammōniakón
salt of Ammon
Literally: “belonging to Ammon”
Follow a root:ἀμμωνιακόν1 word
The story of the word
Torbern Bergman named the substance in 1782 after sal ammoniac, the salt long gathered near the temple of Zeus Ammon at Siwa in the Libyan desert. Ἄμμων is the Greek spelling of the Egyptian god Amun, so the bottle under the sink is named for a god of Thebes by way of a Greek transcription. The ammonite fossil shares the name for a different reason, its coil resembling the ram's horns that Ammon wore.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Egyptian → Ancient Greek → Latin → scientific coinage → English
- First recorded
- 18th century
Same family
ammoniteammoniumammoniacal
In a sentence
The smell of ammonia hit us before the cellar door was fully open.
Half the world's food supply now depends on ammonia made from air.