Chemists also used a bewildering variety of symbols and abbreviations, often self-invented. Sweden’s J. J. Berzelius brought a much-needed measure of order to matters by decreeing that the elements be abbreviated on the basis of their Greek or Latin names, which is why the abbreviation for iron is Fe (from the Latin ferrum) and for silver is Ag (from the Latin argentum). That so many of the other abbreviations accord with their English names (N for nitrogen, O for oxygen, H for hydrogen and so on) reflects English’s latinate nature, not its exalted status. To indicate the number of atoms in a
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