Adapted from an image by Engraving by F. C. Lewis after the painting by T. Phillips. From Faulkner's History of Chelsea, 1829. (public domain), via Wikimedia Commons.
1765–1847
Charles Hatchett
Discovered niobium in 1801.
Element
41NbNiobium
1801
In 1801 Charles Hatchett, examining minerals at the British Museum, found a new metal in an American specimen and named it columbium. In 1844 Heinrich Rose renamed it niobium, after Niobe, daughter of Tantalus, because it is so like tantalum.
Keep exploring
Where the dates and stories on this page come from; each event on the timeline links to its own source.
- Charles HatchettEncyclopaedia Britannica
- NiobiumRoyal Society of Chemistry
- Charles HatchettWikipedia