Americanisms!

Humphrey Davy named it alumium. Then it changed to aluminum, as it still is in N america. Don,t know when we decided on aluminium.

gm

sorry about "who who"

Crossed posts Bags - 1812 it appears.

Bags oh no, this means OH was right. I won't tell him.

Have you not read my post, Sel? It clearly states that Davy renamed it in 1812.

Meant to add, confirmed by OED - aluminium

gracesmum I read Bags's post - bit of a ditherer, Mr Davy. I will present this definitive information to OH tonight and claim trans Altlantic supremacy - thank you.

What about cupcakes instead of fairy cakes?

No, not to rhyme with cattery!

Lab ra tory

Instead of Lab ora tory.

Sir Humphry, pleeeease! He must just have been pretty busy inventing all these things - never a ditherer.
phoenix I always felt the American pronunciation of laboratory was perilously close to lavatory!

Just as well that on both sides of the Atlantic it's most often just referred to as a 'lab'.

anno

Perhaps that's why... too many references to Lab-ratteries.

"Meant to add, confirmed by OED - aluminium" - yes, of course. Because that's what we English call the stuff... but my understanding is that it was initially an error. Mind you, many of the other metalloids elso end in '-ium', so I may be talking out of the back of my neck.

It has been known to happen...

Politically correct Americans are never going to eat fairy cakes are they?

Or have a fag.

"Meant to add, confirmed by OED - aluminium" - yes, of course. Because that's what we English call the stuff... but my understanding is that it was initially an error. Mind you, many of the other metalloids elso end in '-ium', so I may be talking out of the back of my neck.

It has been known to happen...

Yes...thanks for that (again) feetlebaum

Why does nobody believe me? I didn't make it up!
[banging head against wall] emoticon

Well, at least I now understand why so many people do call it aluminum; I always thought it was because they couldn't pronounce it properly [it is one of those words that sounds like an anagram of itself I find].

Years ago I was in W.H. Smith with a school friend from New Zealand when she asked for Durex. Apparently that was what she called Sellotape. The assistant went a dramatic shade of red, as did we!

I can't say I've heard that in NZ, but perhaps I wasn't in a position to be asking for either Sellotape or Durex. They call flip-flops 'jandals' there. Apparently it's an abbreviation of Japanese sandal used by their NZ manufacturer.

gracesmum thinks we don't believe her but I wish to announce that I DO, and I always did. It's all Humphrey Davy's fault anyway.

Oh Heck! DH says it's Daniel Webster's fault – him of Webster's Dictionary.

Bags rushes off to investigate......

Well, it was Noah Webster and here's the story