Hexoxide

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A chemical compound containing six oxygen atoms bonded to a central element or group, used as a term in inorganic chemistry
2. Any oxide whose molecule contains six oxygen atoms linked to a central atom, as named in chemical nomenclature
3. The class of oxides built with six oxygen atoms attached to a core element, a term found in chemistry texts

Etymology: "Hexoxide" is a plain chemical coinage: a Greek number prefix attached to "oxide," with no older story behind it. "Hex-" comes from Ancient Greek "héx," meaning "six," which passed into Latin and then English as part of a family of words built from it, such as "hexagon" and "hexadecimal." "Oxide" has a more interesting past. It was built from "oxygène," the French term coined by Antoine Lavoisier in the 1780s, and "oxygène" itself rests on the Greek "oxús," meaning "sharp" or "acid," joined to "génos," meaning "birth" or "origin." Lavoisier chose the name because he believed oxygen was the essential element of acids, so the word literally means "acid-former." Compounds of this kind follow a regular pattern. Chemists attach a prefix for the number of oxygen atoms to "oxide," so "monoxide" has one, "dioxide" two, and "hexoxide" six. The word was formed by applying that system to a number that Greek supplied long before chemistry existed, and it describes a compound containing six oxygen atoms per molecule.