The origin and usage of the term metalloid is convoluted. Its origin lies in attempts, dating from antiquity, to describe metals and to distinguish between typical and less typical forms. It was first applied to metals that floated on water (lithium, sodium and potassium), and then more popularly to nonmetals. Only recently, since the mid-20th century, has it been widely used to refer to elements with intermediate or borderline properties between metals and nonmetals.
Pre-1800
Ancient conceptions of metals as solid, fusible and malleable substances can be found in Plato's Timaeus (c. 360 BCE) and Aristotle's Meteorology. More sophisticated classification arrangements were proposed by Pseudo-Geber (in the Geber corpus, c. 1310), Paracelsus (De Natura Rerum libri nonem, 1525–6; and later works), Basil Valentine (Conclusiones, 1624), and Boerhaave (Elementa Chemiæ, 1733). They attempted to separate the more characteristic metals from substances having those characteristics to a lesser degree. Such substances included zinc, antimony, bismuth, stibnite, pyrite and galena. These were all then called semimetals or bastard metals. In 1735, Brandt proposed to make the presence or absence of malleability the principle of this classification. On that basis he separated mercury from the metals. The same view was adopted by Vogel (1755, Institutiones Chemiæ) and Buffon (1785, Histoire Naturelle des Minéraux). In the interim, Braun had observed the solidification of mercury by cold in 1759–60. This was confirmed by Hutchins and Cavendish in 1783. The malleability of mercury then became known, and it was included amongst the metals. In 1789, Fourcroy highlighted the weakness of this distinction between metals and semimetals. He said it was evident from the fact that
between the extreme malleability of gold and the singular fragility of arsenic, other metals presented only imperceptible gradations of this character, and because there was probably no greater difference between the malleability of gold and that of lead, which was considered to be a metal, than there was between lead and zinc, which was classed among semi-metals, while in the substances intermediate between zinc and arsenic the differences were slight. This idea of a semimetal, as a brittle (and thereby imperfect) metal, was gradually discarded after 1789 with the publication of Lavoisier's 'revolutionary' Elementary Treatise on Chemistry.
1800–1959
In 1808, Erman and Simon suggested using the term metalloid to refer to the newly discovered elements sodium and potassium. These elements were lighter than water and many chemists did not regard them as proper metals. Erman and Simon's proposal may have been made '[in] an attempt to revive this old distinction between metals and substances resembling metals'. Their suggestion was ignored by the chemical community. In 1811, Berzelius referred to nonmetallic elements as metalloids, in reference to their ability to form oxyanions. A common oxyanion of sulfur, for example, is the sulfate ion SO2−4. Many metals can do the same. Chromium, for instance, can form the chromate ion CrO2−4. Berzelius' terminology was widely adopted although it was subsequently regarded by some commentators as counterintuitive, misapplied, incorrect or invalid. In 1825, in a revised German edition of his Textbook of Chemistry, Berzelius subdivided the metalloids into three classes. These were: constantly gaseous 'gazolyta' (hydrogen, nitrogen, oxygen); real metalloids (sulfur, phosphorus, carbon, boron, silicon); and salt-forming 'halogenia' (fluorine, chlorine, bromine, iodine). In 1844, Jackson gave the meaning of 'metalloid' as 'like metals, but wanting some of their properties.' In 1845, in A dictionary of science, literature and art, Berzelius' classification of the elementary bodies was represented as: I. gazolytes; II. halogens; III. metalloids ('resemble the metals in certain aspects, but are in others widely different'); and IV. metals. In 1864, calling nonmetals 'metalloids' was still sanctioned 'by the best authorities' even though this did not always seem appropriate. The greater propriety of applying the word metalloid to other elements, such as arsenic, had been considered. By as early as 1866, some authors were instead using the term nonmetal, rather than metalloid, to refer to nonmetallic elements. In 1875, Kemshead observed that the elements had been subdivided into two classes—'non-metals or metalloids, and metals.' He added that '[t]he former term, although not so convenient, because a compound word, is more correct, and is now universally employed.' In 1876, Tilden protested against, 'the [still] too common though illogical practice of giving the name metalloid to such bodies as oxygen, chlorine or fluorine'. He instead divided the elements into ('basigenic') true metals, metalloids ('imperfect metals') and ('oxigenic') nonmetals. As late as 1888, classifying the elements into metals, metalloids, and nonmetals, rather than metals and metalloids, was still regarded as peculiar and potentially confusing. Beach, writing in 1911, explained it this way:
Metalloid (Gr. "metal-like"), in chemistry, any nonmetallic element. There are 13, namely, sulfur, phosphorus, fluorin[e], chlorin[e], iodine, bromine, silicon, boron, carbon, nitrogen, hydrogen, oxygen, and selenium. The distinction between the metalloids and the metals is slight. The former, excepting selenium and phosphorus, do not have a "metallic" lustre; they are poorer conductors of heat and electricity, are generally not reflectors of light and not electropositive; that is, no metalloid fails of all these tests. The term seems to have been introduced into modern usage instead of nonmetals for the very reason that there is no hard and fast line between metals and nonmetals, so that "metal-like" or "resembling metals" is a better description of the class than the purely negative "nonmetals". Originally it was applied to the nonmetals which are solid at ordinary temperature. In or around 1917, the Missouri Board of Pharmacy wrote that:
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