Pyroxenic

Part of speech: adjective

Definitions

1. Concerning minerals primarily composed of pyroxene types, indicating geological formations defined by the presence of pyroxene, and referring to substances or rocks where pyroxene plays an essential role
2. Associated with a specific group of silicate minerals known as pyroxenes, involving rock formations identifiable by pyroxene presence, and describing geological materials significant for their pyroxene content
3. Pertaining to or characteristic of minerals belonging to the pyroxene group found in igneous and metamorphic rocks

Etymology: Pyroxenic is a plain technical coinage: it means "of or relating to pyroxene," with the adjective-forming suffix "-ic" attached to the mineral's name. The more interesting story lies in the mineral, whose name is the part that actually carries a history. Pyroxene is built from Greek roots meaning roughly "fire" and "stranger" or "foreign," a pairing that refers to the mineral's behaviour in the furnace rather than to any ancient belief about it. The suffix has a longer journey than the mineral name. It descends from a very old Indo-European ending that passed through Proto-Italic and Latin as "-icus," where it marked a sense of belonging to or resembling something. Old French then adopted it as "-ique," and Middle English took it in the form "-ik" before it settled into the "-ic" spelling used in English today. Pyroxenic is therefore a modern scientific formation: the adjective was built in English by attaching a classical-derived suffix to a mineral name, so no ancient writer ever used it.