has been suggested that, during the 1860s, Böhtlingk pointed out the periodic nature of the Sanskrit alphabet to the Russian chemist Dmitry Mendeleev and thereby helped him in the formulation of the periodic table. According to this suggestion, Mendeleev's use of the prefixes eka, dvi, and tri (Sanskrit for one, two, and three) to name as yet undiscovered chemical elements may be viewed as an homage to Sanskrit grammar and to the Sanskrit grammarian Pāṇini. Bibliography with Rudolph Roth, Sanskrit-Wörterbuch Saint Petersburg 1855–1875. Sanskrit-Wörterbuch in kürzerer Fassung 1879–1889, reprint Buske Verlag, 1998, 2003, Panini's Grammatik 1887, reprint 1998 Indische Sprüche 3 volumes, Saint Petersburg, Akad. d. Wissenschaften, 1863–65. Sanskrit-Chrestomathie, reprinted 1967. Notes References Attribution Further reading Otto Böhtlingk an Rudolf Roth: Briefe zum Petersburger Wörterbuch 1852–1885. Herausgegeben von Heidrun Brückner und Gabriele Zeller. Bearbeitet von Agnes Stache. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz 2007. . External links 1815 births 1904 deaths Writers from Saint Petersburg People from Sankt-Peterburgsky Uyezd 19th-century people from the Russian Empire 19th-century German writers 19th-century German male writers Emigrants from the Russian Empire to Germany German Indologists German philologists Grammarians from Germany Philologists from the Russian Empire Honorary members of the Saint Petersburg Academy of Sciences Recipients of the Pour le Mérite (civil class) German untitled nobility History of linguistics Saint Peter's School (Saint Petersburg) alumni German male non-fiction writers German Sanskrit scholars