German geologist Abraham Gottlob Werner coined the term "Rutile" in 1800. (cfr. Lampadius 1800 and Ludwig 1803). The Latin rutilus, which means "reddish," is where the name comes from. The mineral had previously been known by numerous names, including "red schorl" and a few others that were later identified as synonyms or variations. The mineral was first named Basaltes crystallisatus ruber by I. von Born in his catalogue (1772: 34), which used the latin name Basaltes for both "schorl" and basalt columns at the time.
Von Born identified it as Murán near Revca in Slovakia (Papp 2004). Red or purple schorl is the name Romé de Lisle (1783) gave to a mineral that was discovered as an inclusion in Madagascarn quartz. Subsequently, in 1796, De Saussure provided a description of the Swiss sagenite from St. Gothard. Nowadays, sagenite is understood to be a kind of rutile (of Saussure). In 1795, Klaproth used a sample of hungarischen rother schörl (also known as huangarian red schörl) from what is now Slovakia to define the element titanium. Haüy (1801) used the name titane oxydé, while Richard Kirwan (1796) used the name titanite (in Mindat see the entry titanite (of Kirwan)).
