Titanium

How to spell titanium

8 letters · 4 syllables

How to pronounce titanium

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does titanium mean?

1. nounA strong, lightweight, corrosion-resistant metallic chemical element used in aircraft, implants, and high-end frames.

Titanium in a sentence

• The surgeon fitted a hip joint made from titanium because it resists corrosion inside the body.

• His new bicycle frame was built from titanium to keep the weight low.

Where does titanium come from?

Language of origin: Greek

Titanium takes its name from the Titans, the giant deities of Greek mythology who were said to be the children of the earth and the sky and who ruled before the Olympian gods. The German chemist Martin Heinrich Klaproth coined the word in 1795 when he identified the metallic element, deliberately choosing a mythological name (much as uranium had recently been named after the planet Uranus) rather than a name describing any property of the metal. The Greek root Titan itself meant something like 'one of the great ones' and carried a sense of enormous strength, which suited a metal that would later become famous for its remarkable lightness combined with toughness. The element had actually been spotted a few years earlier by the English clergyman William Gregor, but it was Klaproth's name that stuck. The spelling follows the regular Latinised pattern for element names, where the -ium ending is added to the root, so remembering the mythical Titan inside the word keeps the first syllables in order.

How the word is built

• titan- (from the Titans of Greek myth)
• -ium (suffix naming a metallic chemical element)