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// Workers AI · dad joke modeWhat did vitriol say to its date? You're corrosive to my heart.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
For oil of vitriol, see Sulfuric acid. For other uses, see Vitriol (disambiguation).
Woodcut print from the Berckwerck Buch (1580) by Georgius Agricola depicting mineral mining for vitriol

Vitriol is the general chemical name encompassing a class of chemical compounds comprising sulfates of certain metals – originally, iron or copper. Those mineral substances were distinguished by their color, such as green vitriol for hydrated iron(II) sulfate and blue vitriol for hydrated copper(II) sulfate.[1]

These materials were found originally as crystals of sulfate minerals, formed by evaporation of groundwater that percolated through sulfide minerals and collected in pools on the floors of old mines. The word vitriol comes from the Latin word vitriolum, lit. 'small glass', as those crystals resembled small pieces of colored glass.

The historic alchemical symbol for vitriol is encoded in Unicode as U+1F716 🜖 ALCHEMICAL SYMBOL FOR VITRIOL.[a]

History

[edit]
Ceramic pharmacy jar for storing blue vitriol (vitriol bleu) for medical use (Museum of the Civil Hospices of Lyon [fr]; Hôtel-Dieu de Lyon)

The study of vitriol began during ancient times. Sumerians had a list of types of vitriol that they classified according to the substances' color. Some of the earliest discussions of the origin and properties of vitriol is in the works of the Greek physician Dioscorides (first century AD) and the Roman naturalist Pliny the Elder (23–79 AD). Galen also discussed its medical use. Metallurgical uses for vitriolic substances were recorded in the Hellenistic alchemical works of Zosimos of Panopolis, in the treatise Phisica et Mystica, and the Leyden papyrus X.[2]

Medieval Islamic chemists like Jābir ibn Ḥayyān (died c. 806–816 AD, known in Latin as Geber), Abū Bakr al-Rāzī (865–925 AD, known in Latin as Rhazes), Ibn Sina (980–1037 AD, known in Latin as Avicenna), and Muḥammad ibn Ibrāhīm al-Watwat (1234–1318 AD) included vitriol in their mineral classification lists.[3]

Sulfuric acid was termed "oil of vitriol" by medieval European alchemists because it did not evaporate spontaneously in air (hence oil vs spirit in archaic parlance), and it was prepared by roasting "green vitriol" (typically a mixture of iron and copper sulfates) in an iron retort. The first vague allusions to it appear in the works of Vincent of Beauvais, in the Compositum de Compositis ascribed to Saint Albertus Magnus, and in pseudo-Geber's Summa perfectionis (all thirteenth century AD).[4] The figurative term vitriolic in the sense of "harshly condemnatory" is derived from the corrosive nature of this substance.

Systematic attempts to identify and analyze the nature of the various substances classed as vitriols were in full swing by the late 17th century.[5]

Vitriols

[edit]
Vitriol Chemical Mineral Comment Formula Image
Black vitriol  sulfate • heptahydrate (hydrated sulfate)[A][Cu,Mg,Fe,Mn,Co,Ni]SO4·7H2O[B]
Blue vitriol • Roman vitriol[6] • Vitriol of Cyprus • Vitriol of Venus[7][C]copper(II) sulfatechalcanthite[8]cupric sulfate • pentahydrateCuSO4·5H2O
Copperas • Green vitriol • Vitriol of Mars[9][C]iron(II) sulfatemelanterite[8]ferrous sulfate • heptahydrateFeSO4·7H2O
Red vitriolcobalt(II) sulfate[D] heptahydrateCoSO4·7H2O
Vitriol of argile • Vitriol of clayaluminium sulfatealunogenalumAl2(SO4)3
Vitriol of Jove[9][C]tin(II) sulfate stannous sulfate · deliquescentSnSO4
White vitriolzinc sulfatepossibly goslarite[8]heptahydrateZnSO4·7H2O
  1. ↑ Many sources state that black vitriol "is a mixture of iron sulfate and iron sulfite", but none give a reference of any sort. The book, Chemistry, Inorganic & Organic, with Experiments, by Bloxam[10] is a published, reliable reference for the composition of black vitriol, and it states on page 513, "The formula of black vitriol may be written [CuMgFeMnCoNi]SO4·7H2O, the six isomorphous metals being interchangeable without altering the general character of the salt."
  2. ↑ "Any combination of these elements may be found in black vitriol."[10]
  3. 1 2 3 The names "Venus", "Mars", and "Jove" (a.k.a. Jupiter) refer to planetary metals now known as copper, iron, and tin respectively.
  4. ↑ Historic sources identified red vitriol as the product of heating green vitriol or collecting the remains of distilling vitriol to produce oil of vitriol. These methods are consistent with the oxidation of iron(II) sulfate to iron(III), which decomposes into iron(III) oxide (equivalent to red hematite) and sulfur trioxide.[11] Cobalt was not discovered until the 18th century.

Derivative "oils"

[edit]

Oil of vitriol was an old name for concentrated sulfuric acid, which was historically obtained through the destructive distillation (pyrolysis) of vitriols (sulfates).[5] The name, abbreviated to vitriol, continued to be used for this viscous liquid long after the minerals came to be termed "sulfates".

Oil Chemical Comment Formula Image
Oil of vitriol • Spirit of vitriolsulfuric acidacidH2SO4
Sweet oil of vitrioldiethyl ethernot a sulfate, but can be synthesized from sulfuric acid and ethanol[12][better source needed]CH3-CH2-O-CH2-CH3 Diethyl ether liquid in a brown-tinted glass bottle

Notes

[edit]
  1. ↑ A vertically mirrored version of the same symbol is encoded as U+1F717 🜗 ALCHEMICAL SYMBOL FOR VITRIOL-2.

References

[edit]
  1. ↑ "Vitriol" entry in the online Encyclopaedia Britannica. Accessed on 2020-08-28.
  2. ↑ Karpenko, Vladimír; Norris, John A. (2002). "Vitriol in the History of Chemistry". Chemické listy. 96 (12): 997–1005.
  3. ↑ Karpenko & Norris 2002, pp. 999–1000.
  4. ↑ Karpenko & Norris 2002, pp. 1002–1004.
  5. 1 2 "Some Observations and Experiments about Vitriol, Tending to Find Out the Nature of That Substance, and to Give Further Light in the Inquiry after the Principles and Properties of Other Minerals: Communicated by a Fellow of the R. Society, Who Maketh Use of Chymistry Chiefly as Subservient to Physiology". Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London. 9 (103): 41–47. 1674. doi:10.1098/rstl.1674.0017. JSTOR 101146.
  6. ↑ "Roman vitriol on Chembk CAS Database". chembk.com.
  7. ↑ Kragh, Helge (2024). "Chemical Terms in History: Polysemy and Meaning Transfers". Substantia. doi:10.36253/Substantia-2444.
  8. 1 2 3 Montanari et al. 2024.
  9. 1 2 Kragh 2024, p. 15.
  10. Bloxam, Charles Loudon; Bloxam, Arthur G.; Lewis, S. Judd (1913). "Copper, Cu = 63.57". Chemistry, Inorganic & Organic, with Experiments (Tenth ed.). Philadelphia: P. Blakiston's Son & Co. p. 513. The formula of black vitriol may be written [CuMgFeMnCoNi]SO4·7H2O, the six isomorphous metals being interchangeable without altering the general character of the salt.
  11. Montanari, Giacomo; Marchini, Marianna; Martelli, Matteo; Maini, Lucia (2024). "Artificial vitriols: A contemporary interpretation of historical ingredients". RSC Advances. 14 (30): 21538–21543. doi:10.1039/d4ra01896f. PMC 11228936. PMID 38979453.
  12. ↑ "Synthesis of Ethers". cliffsnotes.com.
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