Johann Friedrich Wilhelm Adolf von Baeyer (; 31 October 1835 – 20 August 1917) was a German chemist who synthesised indigo and developed a nomenclature for cyclic compounds (that was subsequently extended and adopted as part of the IUPAC organic nomenclature). He was ennobled in the Kingdom of Bavaria in 1885 and was the 1905 recipient of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry. Family and education Baeyer was born in Berlin as the son of the noted geodesist and captain of the Royal Prussian Army Johann Jacob Baeyer and his wife Eugenie Baeyer née Hitzig (1807–1843). Both his parents were Lutherans at the time of his birth and he was raised in the Lutheran religion. His mother was the daughter of Julius Eduard Hitzig and a member of the originally Jewish Itzig family, and had converted to Christianity before marrying his father, who was of non-Jewish German descent. Baeyer had four sisters: Clara (born 1826) Emma (born 1831), Johanna (Jeanette) (born 1839), Adelaide (died 1843) and two brothers: Georg (born 1829) and Edward (born 1832). Baeyer lost his mother at a young age while she was giving birth to his sister Adelaide. Although his birth name was Johann Friedrich Wilhelm Adolf Baeyer, he was known simply as "Adolf Baeyer", throughout most of his life. The poet Adelbert von Chamisso and the astronomer Friedrich Wilhelm Bessel were his godparents. On his 50th birthday he was raised to the hereditary nobility by King Ludwig II of Bavaria, conferring on him the "von" distinction. Baeyer became interested in science early, performing experiments on plant nutrition at his paternal grandfather's Müggelsheim farm as a boy. In Berlin he began chemical experimentation at the age of nine. Three years later, he synthesized a previously unknown chemical compound -double carbonate of copper and sodium. On his 13th birthday, he initiated his lifework, buying a chunk of indigo worth two Thalers for his first dye experiments. When a schoolboy, his chemistry teacher at the Friedrich Wilhelm Gymnasium appointed him as his assistant. After graduating from secondary school in 1853, he entered the Berlin University to study physics and mathematics. A stint in the Prussian army interrupted his study until 1856, when he returned to academia at the University of Heidelberg, intending to study chemistry under Robert Bunsen. After an argument with the renowned chemist he changed his mentor to August Kekulé. He continued to collaborate with Kekulé even