Definitions for: Gold


[n] a deep yellow color; "an amber light illuminated the room"; "he admired the gold of her hair"
[n] great wealth; "Whilst that for which all virtue now is sold, and almost every vice--almighty gold"--Ben Jonson
[n] coins made of gold
[n] a soft yellow malleable ductile (trivalent and univalent) metallic element; occurs mainly as nuggets in rocks and alluvial deposits; does not react with most chemicals but is attacked by chlorine and aqua regia
[adj] having the deep slightly brownish color of gold; "long aureate (or golden) hair"; "a gold carpet"
[adj] made from or covered with gold; "gold coins"; "the gold dome of the Capitol"; "the golden calf"; "gilded icons"



Webster (1913) Definition: Gold (g[=o]ld), Golde Golde, Goolde Goolde
(g[=oo]ld), n. (Bot.)
An old English name of some yellow flower, -- the marigold
(Calendula), according to Dr. Prior, but in Chaucer perhaps
the turnsole.


Gold (g[=o]ld), n. [AS. gold; akin to D. goud, OS. & G.
gold, Icel. gull, Sw. & Dan. guld, Goth. gul[thorn], Russ. &
OSlav. zlato; prob. akin to E. yellow. [root]49, 234. See
Yellow, and cf. Gild, v. t.]
1. (Chem.) A metallic element, constituting the most precious
metal used as a common commercial medium of exchange. It
has a characteristic yellow color, is one of the heaviest
substances known (specific gravity 19.32), is soft, and
very malleable and ductile. It is quite unalterable by
heat, moisture, and most corrosive agents, and therefore
well suited for its use in coin and jewelry. Symbol Au
(Aurum). Atomic weight 196.7.

Note: Native gold contains usually eight to ten per cent of
silver, but often much more. As the amount of silver
increases, the color becomes whiter and the specific
gravity lower. Gold is very widely disseminated, as in
the sands of many rivers, but in very small quantity.
It usually occurs in quartz veins (gold quartz), in
slate and metamorphic rocks, or in sand and alluvial
soil, resulting from the disintegration of such rocks.
It also occurs associated with other metallic
substances, as in auriferous pyrites, and is combined
with tellurium in the minerals petzite, calaverite,
sylvanite, etc. Pure gold is too soft for ordinary use,
and is hardened by alloying with silver and copper, the
latter giving a characteristic reddish tinge. [See
Carat.] Gold also finds use in gold foil, in the
pigment purple of Cassius, and in the chloride, which
is used as a toning agent in photography.

2. Money; riches; wealth.

For me, the gold of France did not seduce. --Shak.

3. A yellow color, like that of the metal; as, a flower
tipped with gold.

4. Figuratively, something precious or pure; as, hearts of
gold. --Shak.

Age of gold. See Golden age, under Golden.

Dutch gold, Fool's gold, Gold dust, etc. See under
Dutch, Dust, etc.

Gold amalgam, a mineral, found in Columbia and California,
composed of gold and mercury.

Gold beater, one whose occupation is to beat gold into gold
leaf.

Gold beater's skin, the prepared outside membrane of the
large intestine of the ox, used for separating the leaves
of metal during the process of gold-beating.

Gold beetle (Zo["o]l.), any small gold-colored beetle of
the family Chrysomelid[ae]; -- called also {golden
beetle}.

Gold blocking, printing with gold leaf, as upon a book
cover, by means of an engraved block. --Knight.

Gold cloth. See Cloth of gold, under Cloth.

Gold Coast, a part of the coast of Guinea, in West Africa.


Gold cradle. (Mining) See Cradle, n., 7.

Gold diggings, the places, or region, where gold is found
by digging in sand and gravel from which it is separated
by washing.

Gold end, a fragment of broken gold or jewelry.

Gold-end man.
(a) A buyer of old gold or jewelry.
(b) A goldsmith's apprentice.
(c) An itinerant jeweler. ``I know him not: he looks like
a gold-end man.'' --B. Jonson.

Gold fever, a popular mania for gold hunting.

Gold field, a region in which are deposits of gold.

Gold finder.
(a) One who finds gold.
(b) One who empties privies. [Obs. & Low] --Swift.

Gold flower, a composite plant with dry and persistent
yellow radiating involucral scales, the {Helichrysum
St[oe]chas} of Southern Europe. There are many South
African species of the same genus.

Gold foil, thin sheets of gold, as used by dentists and
others. See Gold leaf.

Gold knobs or knoppes (Bot.), buttercups.

Gold lace, a kind of lace, made of gold thread.

Gold latten, a thin plate of gold or gilded metal.

Gold leaf, gold beaten into a film of extreme thinness, and
used for gilding, etc. It is much thinner than gold foil.


Gold lode (Mining), a gold vein.

Gold mine, a place where gold is obtained by mining
operations, as distinguished from diggings, where it is
extracted by washing. Cf. Gold diggings (above).

Gold nugget, a lump of gold as found in gold mining or
digging; -- called also a pepito.

Gold paint. See Gold shell.

Gold or Golden, pheasant. (Zo["o]l.) See under
Pheasant.

Gold plate, a general name for vessels, dishes, cups,
spoons, etc., made of gold.



Gold of pleasure. [Name perhaps translated from Sp.
oro-de-alegria.] (Bot.) A plant of the genus Camelina,
bearing yellow flowers. C. sativa is sometimes
cultivated for the oil of its seeds.

Gold shell.
(a) A composition of powdered gold or gold leaf, ground up
with gum water and spread on shells, for artists' use;
-- called also gold paint.
(b) (Zo["o]l.) A bivalve shell (Anomia glabra) of the
Atlantic coast; -- called also jingle shell and
silver shell. See Anomia.

Gold size, a composition used in applying gold leaf.

Gold solder, a kind of solder, often containing twelve
parts of gold, two of silver, and four of copper.

Gold stick, the colonel of a regiment of English
lifeguards, who attends his sovereign on state occasions;
-- so called from the gilt rod presented to him by the
sovereign when he receives his commission as colonel of
the regiment. [Eng.]

Gold thread.
(a) A thread formed by twisting flatted gold over a thread
of silk, with a wheel and iron bobbins; spun gold.
--Ure.
(b) (Bot.) A small evergreen plant (Coptis trifolia), so
called from its fibrous yellow roots. It is common in
marshy places in the United States.

Gold tissue, a tissue fabric interwoven with gold thread.


Gold tooling, the fixing of gold leaf by a hot tool upon
book covers, or the ornamental impression so made.

Gold washings, places where gold found in gravel is
separated from lighter material by washing.

Gold worm, a glowworm. [Obs.]

Jeweler's gold, an alloy containing three parts of gold to
one of copper.



Mosaic gold. See under Mosaic.

Synonyms: amber, atomic number 79, Au, aureate, chromatic, gilded, gilt, golden, metal(a), metallic

See Also: atomic number 79, Au, dental gold, gold, gold, gold dust, gold foil, gold leaf, graphic tellurium, green gold, guinea gold, noble metal, precious metal, riches, sylvanite, wealth, yellow, yellowness

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