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Laws of Triads and of Octaves
Early in the 19th cent., a number of chemists had noticed certain relationships between the properties of elements and their atomic weight. In 1829 J. W. DObereiner stated that there existed some three-element groups, or triads, in which the atomic weight of the middle element was the average of the other two and the properties of this element lay between those of the other two. For example, calcium, strontium, and barium form a triad; lithium, sodium, and potassium, another. The English chemist J. A. Newlands found (1863–65) that if the elements are listed according to atomic weight starting with the second, the 8th element following any given element has similar chemical properties, and so does the 16th. This became known as the law of octaves. About the same time, A. E. de Chancourtois arranged the elements according to increasing atomic weight in the form of a vertical helix with eight elements in a turn, so that elements having similar properties fell along vertical lines.
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