Gold’s beauty, its usefulness and its scarcity are three characteristics that are said to account for the high value placed on it. Looking at and holding a solid gold bar inspires unsuspected awe. If iron was as difficult to accumulate, it would likely be nearly as treasured. Although gold does have a couple other desirable properties going for it.
If you look on the Periodic Table of Elements you’ll see that gold is a metal, but it is a unique metal that is yellow in color and it is soft. Also, among the elements it is one of the most heavy. A one foot cube of gold would weigh in at over twelve hundred pounds. Another good property of gold is that it is easy to work with. Gold takes so easily to hammering and shaping that a solid gold bar of it, weighing less than 1/25th ounce (one gram), could be flattened out into a sheet that would be six feet square.
Gold does not tarnish in the air, whereas most of the other metals do (Silver being one of the first things we think of when we hear the word ‘tarnish’). Gold does not lose its brightness and shine; this probably being one of the original reasons for special value being attached to it. Unlike other metals, Gold does not react with other elements and compounds, only being effected by some particular strong acids.
Through history, gold’s most pervasive use has been as money. When coins were made of other metals their value commonly came into question. Coins made of gold were thought to me the most secure.
By the first part of the twentieth century most of the world’s currencies had their value pegged to gold. The meaning of that is that the currencies of countries like the United States dollar, the German mark, and the French franc, were worth a set amount of physical gold for which they could be exchanged, just for the asking. The Gold Standard is what this valuation system is called, and it is no longer in use. However, gold does continue to have an important roll in the trade between nations.
Gold has many uses. Jewelry consumes approximately ten percent of the world’s annual gold production. Dental restoration work makes use of gold. As a very good conductor of electricity, gold finds use in various kinds of electric equipment contacts.
Gold’s high price is maintained by its scarcity. In the 1960′s, a little over one half of all the gold produced came from South Africa. Today, the gold production of China, Australia, the USA, and Peru combine with South Africa to produce over half the world’s gold. In 1886 some of the richest deposits in the world of gold were found in South Africa.
Where is gold found? Gold is present in very small quantities all through the earth’s crust and in seawater. But it is too thinly concentrated to be worth extracting from these sources.In some areas gold became concentrated in veins in quartz rock. Sometimes the gold occurs in the form of big chunks and veins of solid metal. But more often it is scattered through the rock in tiny particles.
Gold is also found in a few minerals and in the ores of some other metals, especially those of silver, copper, and lead. When these metals are refined, the gold is recovered as a by product.
Pure gold is called 24-karat gold. The karat mark on jewelry tells the number of parts out of 24 that are gold. The standard jewelry alloys (combinations of gold with other metals) in the United States are 10,14, and 18 karat.
An interesting historical fact is that for more than three thousand years, dental repair, restorations and adornments have made use of gold.
What about gold’s history with frankincense and myrrh? Of these three first Christmas gifts, only gold is still today a familiar and precious commodity. However, in the time of Christ, both frankincense and myrrh were equally valuable and well known commodities, used in trade between the Middle East and Mediterranean countries.
Gold, because of its rarity and beauty has been the world’s most precious metal since its discovery more than 6,00 years ago. Then, as now, it served as a medium of exchange, and was considered a symbol of wealth and power. Because gold is soft and pliable, it was also used for making fine jewelry and artifacts.
Gold is too soft to be used by itself for most purposes. It is almost always alloyed with another metal. The metals most commonly used are copper, nickel, and silver. For jewelry and dental work, gold is usually alloyed with silver and copper.