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When the word GOLD is mentioned, almost everybody thinks about richness, money, wealth, and beauty. The more gold you have, the richer you are—this is the common perspective of the society. Generally, the society is right about it because when you convert the value of gold into cash, it will surely give you the money of your dreams!

Thus, gold jewelry is often the most desired accessory. Aside from how much money that gold can cost us, there are many things that we should know about it. Here are some examples:

• Compared with other metals, gold is much softer. It can even be hammered so very thin that the light of the sun can shine through it.
• According to history, a total of eighty-eight thousand tons of gold have been extracted from earth ever since.
• Gold is considered as the world’s most precious metal, and it is very rare compared with diamonds.
• Gold is also about eight times heavier than any other metal on earth. No wonder a cubic foot of it can weigh as much as half a ton.
• Gold nuggets are very hard to find, but the biggest one that has ever been found weighed over two hundred pounds in Australia. The largest gold nugget found in the US was just under 200 pounds in California. Both were smelted.
• The all-time high price of gold reached $1029 for just a (troy) ounce. (March 17, 2008; source: goldprice.org)
• At present, the country of South Africa is considered as the largest producer of gold in the world.
• You can make a 60-mile wire out of a single ounce of gold.
• The largest gold mining company in the United States is the Homestake Mining Company located at South Dakota.

Aside from these fast facts, we should also be equipped with information about Fool’s Gold identification, since counterfeiting on gold jewelry and gold coins are now being recorded. How can we really distinguish a fake to a real one? Consider the following differences:

• A fool’s gold is made up of Iron pyrites that has been confusing gold hunters for a long time because of its similarity on color and shape. However, the mineral powder of a real gold is yellow when it is tested by rubbing white porcelain on it, while a fool’s gold is black.
• Hardness is also a factor to tell the difference between the two. A real gold is very much softer like our fingernails than the fake one which is as hard as a knife blade.

Now, what is the so-called gold standard? This precious metal has been used even by the ancient Egyptians, and at the present time, it has contributed a lot when it comes to the world money. Western countries remained using it as the standard value of their money since 1900’s. But now, the role of gold in our money system has become insignificant.

The history of gold prices had been changing throughout the years. It depends on its demand and rarity—this is because there had been so much gold that has been extracted from the earth since it was discovered.

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