Gold has fascinated the human race for thousands of years. It’s mentioned in the Bible, the Koran and even in Egyptian hieroglyphics. The Aztecs were so taken by it that they called it the excrement of the Gods. And as nasty as that sounds it’s a pretty good compliment.
Whenever gold has been found there has been a gold rush. And normally it means death and destruction ensued as in the case of when South America was found by the Europeans and the conquistadors and caused widespread annihilation of tribes . It also led to the gold rushes in the States when gold was found in California.
Although when you think of gold you think that there’d be quite a lot of it around. Though according to the National Geographic “”In all of history, only 161,000 tons of gold have been mined, barely enough to fill two Olympic-size swimming pools.” That would make a cube of gold 20 metres by 20 metres.
It also means that most of the gold mined throughout history, from the Aztecs to the Egyptians and the Romans is still in circulation today. So the gold in your necklace, rings or whatever has probably been worn by people for millenia.
That’s why gold is sold in carats and is diluted down with other metals and why Argos can sell gold.
The price of gold also fluctuates greatly. In 1999 it reached an all time low of $252.90/oz but recovered to a record $1023.50/oz on March 17, 2008. It’s so in demand at the moment that they now sell 12.5kg gold bars off the shelf in Harrods.
So gold is not only pretty and shiny but any that you have is as old as the hill and massively historic. And that’s pretty cool.
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