Czech chemical nomenclature

Foundations of the Czech chemical nomenclature (official term in Czech: české chemické názvosloví) and terminology were laid during the 1820s and 1830s. These early naming conventions fit the Czech language and, being mostly work of a single person, provided a consistent way to name chemical compounds. Over time, the nomenclature expanded considerably, following the recommendations by the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC) in recent era.

Unlike the nomenclature that is used in biology or medicine, the chemical nomenclature stays closer to the Czech language, uses Czech pronunciation and inflection rules but developed its own, very complex, system of morphemes (taken from Greek and Latin), grammar, syntax, punctuation and use of brackets and numerals. Certain terms (such as etanol - ethanol) use the phonetic transcription, but the rules for spelling are inconsistent.

Medieval alchemists in the Czech lands used obscure and inconsistent terminology to describe their experiments. Edward Kelley, an alchemist at the court of Rudolf II, even invented his own secret language. Growth of the industry in the region, during the 19th century, and the nationalistic fervour of the Czech National Revival led to the development of Czech terminologies for natural and applied sciences.

Jan Svatopluk Presl (1791–1849), an all-round natural scientist, proposed a new Czech nomenclature and terminology in the books Lučba čili chemie zkusná (1828–35) and Nerostopis (1837). Presl had invented Czech neologisms for most of the then known chemical elements; ten of these including vodík - hydrogen, kyslík - oxygen, uhlík - carbon, dusík - nitrogen and křemík - silicon has entered into the language. Presl also created naming conventions for oxides where the electronegative component of the compound became the noun, and the electropositive component became an adjective. The adjectives were associated with a suffix, according to valence number of the component they represented (originally there were five suffices: -ný, -natý, -itý, -ový, -elý, later expanded to eight by Vojtěch Šafařík: -ný, -natý, -itý, -ičitý, -ičný and -ečný, -ový, -istý, -ičelý). Salts were identified by the suffix -an added to the noun. Many of the terms created by Presl derive from the Latin, German or Russian; only some had succeeded and stayed in use.

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