While reading books at times you come across anecdotes which turn out to be quite interesting. And your mind wants to look out for more. You search internet, read through articles and skim through Wikipedia to investigate further.
I encountered one such interesting anecdote while reading this book on the origins of quantum physics.
Jachymov is a small town in Czech Republic. Till 1945 it was know by it's German name Joachimthal. Thal is the German for 'valley' hence Joachimthal means 'St. Jaochim's valley'. In the 16th century deposits of silver was discovered in the area and very soon a mining settlement grew up around it. The silver mined from the area was used to mint silver coins which for a long time was the prevalent currency in Europe. The first silver currency minted was for the King of Bohemia; Joachimthal was a part of Bohemian kingdom at that time (image below if one first minted coins).
Since the coins were made of silver produced at Joachimthal, they were called Joachimthaler which with passage of time took the shortened form thaler. Thaler was the predominant silver coin currency in circulation in Europe during the medieval times for over four centuries. It first originated in Germany and gradually spread across Europe.
Each of the countries introduced their own currency but the name 'thaler' stuck with all of them. Later on when the Dutch and Scandinavian countries also introduced their own currency it was called 'daalder' and 'daler' respectively. Thus the name changed it's form with usage based upon the local language. It is from this 'daler' or 'daalder' that dollar derived it's current name. Apart from United States, dollar is also used as the currency in many other countries across the world.
Now silver was not the only mineral to be found in Joachimthal. Along with Silver, Nickel, Bismuth and Uranium was also mined at this location. At the end of nineteenth century, Marie Curie was working on radioactivity along with her husband Pierre Curie. Actually the term 'radioactivity' was yet to be coined then. Only few years earlier Professor Henri Becquerel had accidentally discovered the strange property of uranium ore while investigating X-Rays discovered by Rontgen. Marie Curie came to France and got interested in this new phenomenon. She calculated the amount of radiation emanated from uranium ore and reached the conclusion that there must be something else in the ore apart from uranium which is causing the unknown yet intense ray emanation from the ore.
Joachimthal at that time was the foremost source of uranium ore pitchblende in Europe and huge amount of the ore was discarded after the extraction of uranium. Marie and Piere Curie then working on the subject got a ton of the ore from Joachimthal. Thereafter through a time consuming process and lot of perseverance purified and obtained two new radioactive elements from the mass. The first one they named Polonium based on Marie Curie's country of birth and the second one they named Radium based on the Latin word for ray which is 'radius'. It is in the same paper wherein they presented the discovery of this element that the they first used the term radioactivity.
This how a Joachimthal's silver led it's name to the most widely used currency in the world and it's pitchblende led to the foundation of an entirely new branch of physics. And left it's immortal marks on the pages of scientific history.
Joachimthal continued for a long time the prime source of uranium based ore in the world till the discovery of further reserves in Africa, Central Asia and elsewhere.
References:
I encountered one such interesting anecdote while reading this book on the origins of quantum physics.
Jachymov is a small town in Czech Republic. Till 1945 it was know by it's German name Joachimthal. Thal is the German for 'valley' hence Joachimthal means 'St. Jaochim's valley'. In the 16th century deposits of silver was discovered in the area and very soon a mining settlement grew up around it. The silver mined from the area was used to mint silver coins which for a long time was the prevalent currency in Europe. The first silver currency minted was for the King of Bohemia; Joachimthal was a part of Bohemian kingdom at that time (image below if one first minted coins).
Each of the countries introduced their own currency but the name 'thaler' stuck with all of them. Later on when the Dutch and Scandinavian countries also introduced their own currency it was called 'daalder' and 'daler' respectively. Thus the name changed it's form with usage based upon the local language. It is from this 'daler' or 'daalder' that dollar derived it's current name. Apart from United States, dollar is also used as the currency in many other countries across the world.
Now silver was not the only mineral to be found in Joachimthal. Along with Silver, Nickel, Bismuth and Uranium was also mined at this location. At the end of nineteenth century, Marie Curie was working on radioactivity along with her husband Pierre Curie. Actually the term 'radioactivity' was yet to be coined then. Only few years earlier Professor Henri Becquerel had accidentally discovered the strange property of uranium ore while investigating X-Rays discovered by Rontgen. Marie Curie came to France and got interested in this new phenomenon. She calculated the amount of radiation emanated from uranium ore and reached the conclusion that there must be something else in the ore apart from uranium which is causing the unknown yet intense ray emanation from the ore.
This how a Joachimthal's silver led it's name to the most widely used currency in the world and it's pitchblende led to the foundation of an entirely new branch of physics. And left it's immortal marks on the pages of scientific history.
Joachimthal continued for a long time the prime source of uranium based ore in the world till the discovery of further reserves in Africa, Central Asia and elsewhere.
References:
- Uncertainity by David Lindley
- Wikipedia
- The writer doesn't claim ownership / copyright of the images
No comments:
Post a Comment