An attempt at classifying elements made by John Newlands(1837–98) in 1863. He arranged 56 elements in order of increasing atomic mass in groups of eight, pointing out that each element resembled the element eight places from it in the list. He drew an analogy with the notes of a musical scale. Newlands’ octaves were groups of similar elements distinguished in this way: e.g. oxygen and sulphur; nitrogen and phosphorus; and fluorine, chlorine, bromine, and iodine. In some cases it was necessary to put two elements in the same position. The proposal was rejected at the time. See periodic table.

http://web.lemoyne.edu/~giunta/newlands.html John Newlands’ paper