How are metallic compounds named?
1 Answer
Metal compounds are typically ionic compounds, in which a metal cation is ionically bonded to an anion. The anion can be from a single element, such as chlorine, or it can be a polyatomic ion such as the hydroxide ion.
The following rules are followed when naming metallic (ionic) compounds.
- The metal is named first. Its name is unchanged.
- The anion is named last. If it is from an element, such as chlorine, its name is changed so that one or more syllables are dropped and the ending -ide is added, such as chloride.
- Many metals, especially transition metals, have more than one possible charge, such as copper. In this case, the charge of the ion is indicated with a Roman numeral, and the name of the metal is given as copper (I) or copper (II), for example.
Examples.
Notice that Greek prefixes are not used when naming metallic compounds. For example,