Science & TechnologyGreek → English
Bromine
/ˈbroʊmiːn/noun
A dark red liquid element with a choking smell, number 35 in the periodic table.
The Greek roots
βρῶμος
brômos
stench, bad smell
Literally: “stinking one”
Follow a root:βρῶμος1 word
The story of the word
Antoine Balard isolated it in 1826 from the salt marsh brines near Montpellier, and the French commission that reviewed his work named it for the smell. Its neighbour in the same column had been named for a colour, iodine from ἰοειδής, violet. Bromide salts were sold as sedatives through the nineteenth century, which is how bromide came to mean a dull soothing remark.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → scientific coinage → English
- First recorded
- 1827
Same family
bromidebromismbromhidrosis
In a sentence
A sealed ampoule of bromine sat in the cabinet, the vapour visible above the liquid.