Science & TechnologyGreek → English
Methane
/ˈmɛθeɪn/noun
The simplest hydrocarbon, a colourless flammable gas of one carbon and four hydrogens.
The Greek roots
μέθυ
méthy
wine, strong drink
ὕλη
hýlē
wood, matter
Literally: “wine wood”
The story of the word
Dumas and Péligot named methylene in 1835 from μέθυ and ὕλη, wine and wood, because the spirit they were working with came out of distilled timber. Methyl was clipped from that, and methane followed in 1867 when chemists wanted a systematic name for marsh gas. Μέθυ is the same ancient word as English mead, both going back to a root for honey drink, so the commonest hydrocarbon in the universe is named after fermented honey and firewood.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → scientific coinage → English
- First recorded
- 1867
Same family
methanolmethylmethyleneamethyst
In a sentence
Methane leaking from the wellhead does more damage in twenty years than the carbon dioxide it becomes.
The bubbles rising through the frozen pond were methane.