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Figure 5. An original 1758 copy of Cronstedt's
Forsok till Mineralogiens eller mineral-Rikets
upstalling ('An attempt at mineralogy or arrange-
ment of the Mineral Kingdom"), provided by our
Swedish hosts." The author's name has been
penciled in at the upper left because it was pub-
lished anonymously. LOWER: the specific entry
for nickel vitriol"': "Is of a deep green color, and is
contained in/Kupfernickel or in other erosion
products/at the Los Cobalt mine."
Chair of Chemistry of Uppsala (the more pro-
gressive Torbern Bergman, 1735-1784, the
mentor of Scheele, did not replace Wallerius
until 1767). Wallerius had just written a treatise
"Mineralogy"" which was rendered obsolete by
Cronstedt's new mineralogy.2" For example,
Wallerius maintained that heavy spar (barium
sulfate) was a form of gypsum (calcium sulfate)
when Cronstedt's blowpipe would immediate-
ly differentiate them (green and red flames,
respectively). Far ahead of his time, Cronstedt
reported in Forsok an "unidentified earth" in a
"r6dlatt Tungsten" (red heavy stone)'d" from the
Bastnas Mine in Riddarhyttan" which 45 years
later was isolated by Berzelius and Hisinger
from that same mine and named "cerium""
the first element of the lanthanide series.
Cronstedt was not optimistic about the
acceptance of his ideas; in the Foreword of
Fbrsok, he complained about those who were
"so addicted to the surface of things, that they
are shocked at the boldness of calling Marble a
Limestone...."lobh (the two are chemically iden-
tical, CaCO3). To his surprise, his ideas were
rapidly accepted. By the time the English trans-
lation"' appeared, the author was well known
and his name appeared with distinction on the
cover page. Also in this English translation, a
beautiful treatise appears of Cronstedt's meth-
ods of the blowpipe. The translator was Gustaf
von Engestrdm (1738-1813), the successor to
Brandt as manager of the Laboratorium
Chymicum. Engestrom, in his praise for the
treatise, remarked that he had "never seen a
book so rapidly become known."'
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figure o. An expert on Swedish chemistry, Dr. Per Enghag (left), has written perhaps the most complete and
objective account of the discovery of the elements." He has been especially helpful in contributing much
information for the "Rediscovery" project, including details of the lives of the Swedish scientists.
Figure 7. Copper can oxidize to form a green patina, for example, as is seen with the Statue of Liberty. The
mineral Kupfernickel (left) confounded the medieval miners; it appeared to be copper, because it can grow a
green coating (right), but in the hands of the coppersmith it didn't behave. Obviously, it was cursed, hence
its name "copper devil" (German). Actually, the mineral was nickeline (nickel arsenide, NiAs), which oxidizes
to form apple-green annabergite (nickel arsenate, Ni3(AsO4)2.8H20). From the element collection of the
authors.
The discovery of nickel. Miners in Germany
had often seen reddish stones which could be
dissolved in nitric acid to produce greenish
solutions, behaving like copper. However, it
was impossible to obtain any metallic copper
from these solutions. The undesirable stones
were called "Kupfernickel" (copper-devil)
(Figure 7) since they obviously were cursed.'
After Cronstedt had finished his sabbatical
at Brandt's copper mines in 1748 at
Riddarhyttan, he was well aware that cobalt
was also available in quantity at Los, 210 km
north (Figure 8). Thinking that Los might have
more interesting minerals, Cronstedt visited the
mine (Figure 9) and came away with several
new specimens. One particular mineral dis-
solved in nitric acid to generate a green solution
(just as in Germany). Electroless deposition was
not understood in the mid-18th century, but it
had been known since Paracelsus (and
explained ca. 1700 by Lemery and Homberg on
the "atomic theory" of "pointy acid particles"2)
THE HEXAGON/SUMMER 2014
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