Arsenic, as it is usually seen in the shops, is not a metal, but an oxyd, from which the metal may be easily obtained by mixing it with half its weight of black flux, and introducing the mixture into a Florence flask, gradually raised to a red heat, in a sand bath. A brilliant metallic sublimate of pure arsenic collects in the upper part of the flask. arsenic is of a steel blue color, quite brittle, and the metal with all its compounds, is a virulent poison, vulgarly called rats-bane. It forms alloys with most of the metals. Combined with sulphur it forms orpiment or realgar, which are the yellow and red sulphurets of arsenic Orpiment is the true arsenicum of the ancients. Plin. 34, 18. native orpiment appears in yellow, brilliant, and seemingly talcky masses of various sizes; realgar is red, of different shades, and often crystallized in needles. arsenic is also found as a mineralizer in cobalt, antimony, copper, iron and silver ores. It is brought chiefly from the cobalt works in Saxony, where zaffer is made.
Word of the Day: Catachrestical
Pertaining to, or derived from, arsenic; -- said of those compounds of arsenic in which this element has its highest equivalence; as, arsenic acid.
1. One of the elements, a solid substance resembling a metal in its physical properties, but in its chemical relations ranking with the nonmetals. It is of a steel-gray color and brilliant luster, though usually dull from tarnish. It is very brittle, and sublimes at 356¡ Fahrenheit. It is sometimes found native, but usually combined with silver, cobalt, nickel, iron, antimony, or sulphur. Orpiment and realgar are two of its sulphur compounds, the first of which is the true arsenicum of the ancients. The element and its compounds are active poisons. Specific gravity from 5.7 to 5.9. Atomic weight 75. Symbol As.
Arsenic
Encyclopedia Britannica
ARSENIC and its Compounds. Although arsenic was not recognised as a metallic element till the 18th century, several of its compounds were known from remote antiquity; and the name αρσενικόν (from άρσην, male) was applied by Dioscorides to the yellow sulphide of arsenic, orpiment, on account of its very potent properties. To the present day 1 E.g., Metz and Strasbourg, containing military factories and extensive arsenals, were situated on the front line of danger.
the term arsenic is more frequently applied to arsenious acid (the white arsenic of commerce) than to the metallic element to which it strictly applies. Although not very abundant, arsenic is one of the most widely disseminated of all metallic elements, few sulphur ores being free from traces of it. Metallic arsenic is found native in veins in metamorphic rocks in the mining districts of Saxony and Bohemia, and other European localities, at Zmeov in Siberia, and very abundantly in the silver mines at Chanarçillo in Chili. The ores employed in the metallurgy of arsenic are mispickel or arsenical pyrites, smaltite, and cobaltite; the arsenic in the case of the two last being a bye-product of the preparation of cobalt and nickeL...
Arsenic is a highly brittle metal of a steel-grey colour, and of no very great importance in the arts. It may be prepared direct from arsenical pyrites by subliming in closed retorts, but it is more commonly reduced with powdered charcoal from arsenious acid. The physical characteristics of the metal vary according to the mode of its preparation; that produced directly from pyrites being compact, crystalline, and nearly white, while the metal reduced from arsenious acid is grey and pulverulent. It is chiefly used for mixing with lead in the manufacture of small shot, the alloy dropping in rounder forms than pure lead, which produces tailed drops. Arsenic is added to iron and steel for the manufacture of chains and ornaments, the resulting combination taking a very brilliant polish; and an alloy of copper and arsenic produces a brittle grey metal of a brilliant silvery hue, used in the manufacture of buttons.
Arsenious acid, or more properly anhydride, the arsenic or white arsenic of commerce, is the form in which arsenic is chiefly produced in metallurgical operations. It is found native to a small extent, and known by the mineralogical name arsenite. The greater proportion of arsenious acid is obtained as a bye-product of the reduction of cobalt and nickel from their ores. At Reichenstein in Silesia, and Ribas in Catalonia, mispickel is worked for arsenic. From the returns received at the English Mining Record Office it appears that 5449 tons of arsenic were produced in England in 1873. More than one-third of this came from one mine in Devonshire, where the arsenical pyrites is converted into white arsenic by roasting. In the reduction of the ores, which is accomplished in reverberatory furnaces, special precautions have to be employed to defend the workman against arsenical fumes and dust. The arsenic is obtained as an impure white powder, which is sublimed till sufficiently pure; and thereafter, by sublimation at a high temperature, the product is formed into a glassy mass. This glass is at first perfectly transparent, but it soon assumes the opaque white appearance arsenic presents in commerce. Besides being the basis of most arsenical preparations and compounds, it is used in the manufacture of glass for reducing the iron oxide contained in sand. White arsenic is one of the most violent of the acrid poisons. Its toxicological relations, the tests for it, <fcc., will be treated of under Medical Jurisprudence.
Arsenic acid is prepared from arsenious acid on the manufacturing scale by oxidising with strong nitric acid. It also is poisonous, but to a less degree than arsenious acid; and it is noticed that people employed about it become very fat, without any injury to health being apparent. It is now very extensively employed in the manufacture of aniline dyes, and also as a substitute for tartaric acid in discharging colours in calico printing. Both arsenite and arseniate of soda are used as “dung-substitutes” in calico-printing. Scheele’s green is an arsenite of copper, and Schweinfurth green is the aceto-arsenite of copper. Both are brilliant green pigments in extensive use, and their employment by paper-stainers has caused a good deal of excitement and unnecessary terror. The rubbing off of arsenical particles in cleaning wall-papers may be injurious to health, but there is no possibility of any arsenical exhalation arising from the walls as has been alleged.
Two sulphur compounds of arsenic—realgar and orpiment—are also of industrial importance. Realgar, or ruby sulphur, is the disulphide of arsenic; and in its native form it was known to the ancients, being the σανδαράκη of Theophrastus. It is prepared usually from arsenious acid by mixing and melting it with,the required proportion of sulphur. It is used only to a limited extent as a pigment, and is a constituent of the Indian white fire used in fire signals and pyrotechny. Orpiment (auripigmentum), the yellow sulphide of arsenic (the αρσενικόν of Dios-co rides), occurs native in many localities. It is, like realgar, artificially prepared by mixing arsenious acid with the requisite quantity of sulphur, and subliming the mixture. Sulphur is used in proportione varying according to the depth of yellow desired, the orpiment of commerce not being a definite chemical compound, but a mixture of arsenious acid and the yellow sulphide, the light tints sometimes containing as much as 97 per cent, of white arsenic. It forms the artists’ colour called king’s yellow; and in addition to some use as a common pigment, it is employed in dyeing and calico-printing. The preparations of arsenic used in pharmacy, in addition to arsenious acid, are Liquor arsenicalis, or Fowler’s solution, the hydrochloric solution of arsenic, arseniate of iron, and the arseniate of soda.
9th ed. Encyclopædia Britannica, vol. 2, p. 634
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To combine with arsenic.
combined with arsenic.
of Arsenicate
of Arsenicate
A diseased condition produced by slow poisoning with arsenic.
Bane Roget’s Thesaurus §663
N. bane, curse, evil, hurtfulness, painfulness, scourge, damnosa hereditas, white elephant, sting, fang, thorn, tang, bramble, brier, nettle, poison, toxin, teratogen, leaven, virus venom, arsenic, antimony, tartar emetic, strychnine, nicotine, miasma, miasm, mephitis, malaria, azote, sewer gas, pest, albany hemp, arsenious oxide, arsenious acid, bichloride of mercury, carbonic acid, carbonic gas, choke damp, corrosive sublimate, fire damp, hydrocyanic acid, cyanide, prussic acid, hydrogen cyanide, marsh gas, nux vomica, ratsbane, hemlock, hellebore, nightshade, belladonna, henbane, aconite, banewort, bhang, ganja, hashish, upas tree, toxline, rust, worm, helminth, moth, moth and rust, fungus, mildew, dry rot, canker, cankerworm, cancer, torpedo, viper, demon, toxicology
Adj. baneful, poisonous, phr, bibere venenum in auro, 3. contingent subservience
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