Abstract
Context. We present deep spectroscopy of a large sample of low-metallicity emission-line galaxies. Aims: The main goal of this study is to derive element abundances in these low-metallicity galaxies. Methods: We analyze 121 VLT spectra of H ii regions in 46 low-metallicity emission-line galaxies. Of these spectra 83 are archival VLT/FORS1+UVES spectra of H ii regions in 31 low-metallicity emission-line galaxies that are studied for the first time with standard direct methods to determine the electron temperatures, the electron number densities, and the chemical abundances. Results: The oxygen abundance of the sample lies in the range 12 + log O/H = 7.2-8.4. We confirm previous findings that Ne/O increases with increasing oxygen abundance, likely because of a higher depletion of oxygen in higher-metallicity galaxies. The Fe/O ratio decreases from roughly solar at the lowest metallicities to about one tenth of solar, indicating that the degree of depletion of iron into dust grains depends on metallicity. The N/O ratio in extremely low-metallicity galaxies with 12 + log O/H < 7.5 shows a slight increase with decreasing oxygen abundance, which could be the signature of enhanced production of primary nitrogen by rapidly rotating stars at low metallicity. We present the first empirical relation between the electron temperature derived from [S iii]lambda6312/lambda9069 or [N ii]lambda5755/lambda6583 and the one derived from [O iii]lambda4363/lambda(4959+5007) in low-metallicity galaxies. We also present an empirical relation between te derived from [O ii]lambda3727/(lambda7320 + lambda7330) or [S ii]lambda4068/(lambda6717 + lambda6730) and [O iii]lambda4363/lambda(4959+5007). The electron number densities Ne(Cl iii) and Ne(Ar iv) were derived in a number of objects and are found to be higher than Ne(O ii) and Ne(S ii). This has potential implications for the derivation of the pregalactic helium abundance. In a number of objects, the abundances of C++ and O++ could be derived from recombination lines. Our study confirms the discrepancy between abundances found from recombination lines (RLs) and collisionally excited lines (CELs) and that C/O increases with O/H.