The periodic table of elements – first put together by Mendeleev in 1869 – sometimes seems to have almost mystical properties
Mendeleev's 1869 periodic table; note that his arrangement presents the periods vertically, and the groups horizontally: wikipedia
But for my money, the all-time greatest wordplay related to the periodic table is this “doubly true” anagram, which won Mike Keith the special category prize in May 1999 at Anagrammy.com. The initial anagram equates thirty elements on the periodic table with 30 other elements:
hydrogen + zirconium + tin + oxygen + rhenium + platinum + tellurium + terbium + nobelium + chromium + iron + cobalt + carbon + aluminum + ruthenium + silicon + ytterbium + hafnium + sodium + selenium + cerium + manganese + osmium + uranium + nickel + praseodymium + erbium + vanadium + thallium + plutonium
=
nitrogen + zinc + rhodium + helium + argon + neptunium + beryllium + bromine + lutetium + boron + calcium + thorium + niobium + lanthanum + mercury + fluorine + bismuth + actinium + silver + cesium + neodymium + magnesium + xenon + samarium + scandium + europium + berkelium + palladium + antimony + thulium
That’s more than half the periodic table—pretty amazing, especially since he used the elements with Xs and Zs. The kicker is that if you replace each element with its number on the periodic table, the anagram still balances:
1 + 40 + 50 + 8 + 75 + 78 + 52 + 65 + 102 + 24 + 26 + 27 + 6 + 13 + 44 + 14 + 70 + 72 + 11 + 34 + 58 + 25 + 76 + 92 + 28 + 59 + 68 + 23 + 81 + 94
=
7 + 30 + 45 + 2 + 18 + 93 + 4 + 35 + 71 + 5 + 20 + 90 + 41 + 57 + 80 + 9 + 83 + 89 + 47 + 55 + 60 + 12 + 54 + 62 + 21 + 63 + 97 + 46 + 51 + 69
= 1416
Tags: Anagram, Mike Keith, Periodic table
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