Definition of the word nickel

The word "nickel" has an interesting origin. It was named after the German mineralogist Axel Frederic Cronstedt, who discovered the nickel ore in 1751. Cronstedt named it "kupfernickel" which translates to "copper devil" in German. The name refers to the difficulty he had in isolating the metal from its ores, which led him to consider the process as "devilish". When the metal was extracted and refined, the British coined the word "nickel" which became the standard term in the English language. The British Empire was a major consumer of the metal at the time, and the name "nickel" gradually replaced "coppernickel". Today, the word "nickel" is widely used in many languages to refer to the chemical element with the symbol Ni.