Who Named Vitamins, and Why the E Was Dropped From Vitamine
Casimir Funk coined vitamine in 1912 for food factors he took to be organic bases. Jack Drummond dropped the final e in 1920, because not every vitamin contains an amine group. Vitamins A and C still carry his letters on today's labels.
The history of the word vitamin starts in 1912, when Casimir Funk coined vitamine for food factors he took to be organic bases. Eight years later, Jack Drummond dropped the final e. The spelling changed because not every vitamin contains an amine group, and the first three letters came from the same 1920 proposal. Vitamins A and C still carry those letters on today's labels. ## Funk's 1912 word, and what it meant Funk's paper, "The etiology of the deficiency diseases," ran in the Journal of State Medicine in 1912. A [1975 reprint in Nutrition Reviews](https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1753-4887.1975.tb05095.x) carries the original title, which lists beri-beri, polyneuritis in birds, epidemic dropsy, scurvy and pellagra among the conditions he covered. A [University of Helsinki copy of the 1912 text](https://www.mv.helsinki.fi/home/hemila/History/Funk_1912.pdf) shows what he meant by the new word. Funk wrote that the deficient substances "are of the nature of organic bases," and that he would call them "vitamines." The first names were built from diseases. He spoke of "a beri-beri or scurvy vitamine," meaning a substance that prevents that special disease. The scurvy side of that story is in our [vitamin C history, from scurvy to ascorbic acid](/blog/history/history-of-vitamin-c-from-scurvy-to-ascorbic-acid). ## Drummond's e, and the first letters In 1920, Drummond proposed calling the substances found by Elmer Verner McCollum and by Funk Vitamins A and B, and he gave his anti-scurvy factor the letter C. The [Science Museum Group's record of Drummond's specimens](https://collection.sciencemuseumgroup.org.uk/objects/co8630635/specimen-jar-made-by-sir-jack-cecil-drummond-c-1920) gives that sequence and says he dropped the final e from Funk's word. The reason, as the museum record gives it, is chemical. Not all vitamins contain an amine group, so the spelling no longer fit them. According to PubMed, his paper ran in the Biochemical Journal in October 1920 under the title ["The Nomenclature of the so-called Accessory Food Factors (Vitamins)."](https://doi.org/10.1042/bj0140660) ## The letters after A, B and C The letters kept coming as the substances were pinned down. In 1922, McCollum and colleagues published [an experimental demonstration of the existence of a vitamin which promotes calcium deposition](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/11991957/). In 1935, Henrik Dam's work on a chick factor produced a paper in the Biochemical Journal titled ["The antihaemorrhagic vitamin of the chick."](https://doi.org/10.1042/bj0291273) A [2014 Danish history article](https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25639072/) records that the factor was named vitamin K that year. For the supplement side of vitamin K, see our [vitamin K2 monograph](/ingredients/vitamin-k2). The vitamin D story is in our [vitamin D guide](/health/vitamin-d-complete-guide). The sources checked for this page do not document the dropped or reassigned letters that a fuller history would cover. We could not verify those, so this page does not name them. ## What the label keeps Federal rules fix the order of vitamins and minerals on a supplement label. The [regulation at 21 CFR 101.36](https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/21/101.36) lists vitamin A, vitamin C, vitamin D, vitamin E and vitamin K first, followed by thiamin, riboflavin, niacin, vitamin B6, folate and folic acid, vitamin B12, biotin, pantothenic acid and choline. The same rule lets a label add the chemical name in parentheses. Its examples are "Vitamin C (ascorbic acid)" and "thiamin (vitamin B1)." So the disease-era names and the chemistry names still sit side by side on a bottle. **Bottom line.** Funk named the factors, and Drummond fixed the spelling and the first three letters in 1920. Vitamins A and C still carry those letters. When you read a label, the chemical name in parentheses tells you more than the letter does. ## Questions people ask ### Who coined the word vitamine, and what did it stand for? Casimir Funk coined it in his 1912 paper on the deficiency diseases. He described the deficient substances as organic bases, which is the amine idea built into the word, and he called them vitamines. He also wrote of "a beri-beri or scurvy vitamine," a substance that prevents each disease. Drummond later found that the amine idea was too narrow, which is why the spelling changed. ### Why was the final e dropped from vitamine? Jack Drummond dropped it in 1920 because not every vitamin contains an amine group. The Science Museum Group's record of his specimens says so directly. The change kept the name and removed the chemical claim built into the spelling. [His paper](https://doi.org/10.1042/bj0140660) appeared in the Biochemical Journal that year. ### Why do vitamins have letters, and why are some letters missing? The first letters came from Drummond's 1920 proposal, when A and B went to the substances McCollum and Funk described and C to the anti-scurvy factor. Later letters followed as substances were identified, and the 1935 naming of vitamin K is one dated example. The sources checked for this page do not explain the gaps, so this page does not guess at them. ### Which early vitamin candidates were removed from the list? The sources checked for this page do not document specific removals, so this page names none. What they do document is the 1920 scheme and the 1935 naming of vitamin K. A fuller answer would need the original papers for each dropped letter, and this page does not claim more than the papers it checked support. ### Why are some vitamins named for their chemistry and others for their diseases? Funk's first names were disease names, such as a beri-beri vitamine or a scurvy vitamine, each meaning a substance that prevents that disease. Chemical names sit alongside the letters now. The regulation allows "vitamin C (ascorbic acid)" and "thiamin (vitamin B1)" on the label, so a reader can see the disease-era name and the chemical name together. ### How did the naming system shape supplement labels today? The federal order on a supplement label puts vitamin A, vitamin C, vitamin D, vitamin E and vitamin K first, then the named B vitamins and choline. So the letters that survive on the modern panel are A, C, D, E and K, while the B vitamins appear as thiamin, riboflavin, niacin, B6, folate, B12, biotin and pantothenic acid. That order is fixed by [21 CFR 101.36](https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/21/101.36), not by the letters themselves. Funk's word lasted eight years before Drummond changed the spelling. The letter K arrived 15 years after that. **Next reads** - [Vitamin C history, from scurvy to ascorbic acid](/blog/history/history-of-vitamin-c-from-scurvy-to-ascorbic-acid): the disease-to-chemistry story behind Funk's scurvy vitamine. - [Vitamin K2 monograph](/ingredients/vitamin-k2): the supplement form of the vitamin that got the letter K in 1935. ### Related reading - [Beriberi and the thiamine story](/blog/history/history-of-thiamine-b1-from-beriberi-to-eijkman) - [The B vitamins and their numbers](/blog/history/history-of-the-b-complex-from-one-factor-to-eight) - [Vitamin P and the citrus fraction](/blog/history/history-of-vitamin-p-from-citrus-peel-to-flavonoids)