Aluminic

Part of speech: adjective

Definitions

1. Relating to or composed of the metallic element aluminium, or containing this element as a component
2. Involving or made from aluminium, the lightweight silvery-white metal found in bauxite ore
3. Pertaining to or characterized by the presence of aluminium in its chemical composition

Etymology: Chemists built "aluminic" by adding the suffix "-ic" to "aluminium," the metal's name. That suffix marks an adjective for chemical compounds, and in older chemical naming it often signaled a higher combining state of an element, as in "ferric" beside "ferrous." "Aluminic" is therefore used for aluminium compounds, and it is the form chemists reach for when describing them. The metal's name goes back to "alumen," the Latin word for alum, a mineral salt used in dyeing and tanning. The earth derived from alum was called "alumina," and the English chemist Humphry Davy proposed "alumium" as a name for the metal that such earths contained. The spelling later shifted to "aluminium" in British usage, which is why the root looks more Latin than the English word for the metal suggests.