Earth & SkyGreek → English
Pyroxene
/ˈpaɪrɒksiːn/noun
A major group of dark rock-forming silicates, abundant in basalt, gabbro and many meteorites.
The Greek roots
πῦρ
pŷr
fire
ξένος
xénos
stranger, guest
Literally: “stranger to fire”
The story of the word
René Just Haüy named it in 1796 on a mistake. Seeing the crystals embedded in lava, he decided they were foreigners caught up in the flow rather than natives of it, and gave them a name meaning strangers in the fire. They crystallise directly out of the melt, so they are as native as anything in the rock, and the name has outlived the theory by two centuries. ξένος also gives xenophobia and xenon, the gas Ramsay called 'the stranger' in 1898.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → French coinage → English
- First recorded
- 19th century
Same family
pyrepyrotechnicsxenonxenophobia
In a sentence
Under the microscope the pyroxene shows its stubby right-angled cleavage.