Vestium or Ruthenium – What Does a Study of the Literature Tell Us?

Abstract

The process of the discovery of the sixth new element and metal present in raw platinum ore granules, and called vestium or ruthenium, took place between 1807 and 1844. The element was first discovered by the Polish chemist and medical doctor, J?drzej ?niadecki, professor at Vilnius University, presently Lithuania. It took almost 40 years to confirm the discovery by two German chemists working in Russia, Gottfried Osann and Carl Ernst Claus, who had at their disposition platinum ore recently discovered in the Ural Mountains. The discovery work of J?drzej ?niadecki was supported by his older brother Jan ?niadecki, a noted mathematician and astronomer, who was also the Rector of Vilnius University at the time of the original discovery. ?niadecki brothers were educated in Poland (Pozna? and Cracow) and abroad: J?drzejin Pavia (Italy), Edinburgh (Scotland) and Vienna, and Janin Göttingen, Leiden, Utrecht and prerevolutionary Paris.