- Auri Sacra Fames -

The New York Times recently published a three-part series of articles on the "cost of gold" in terms of social and environmental damage. Personally, I much prefer silver jewelry, but the accursed hunger for gold, as the Roman poet Virgil put it, is deeply entrenched in our culture, making us move tons of rock for a few ounces of the yellowish, malleable metal.
Do you remember the fairy tale Rumpelstiltskin? Because of her father's boasting, the hapless girl has to spin straw into gold, create value out of worthless matter, which she can only accomplish with the help of the impish Rumpelstiltskin. Other fairy tales and legends abound with golden crowns, golden rings (would Frodo have carried a silver ring all that way to Mordor?) and entire hoards of the stuff, which occasionally have been found, while others still might await discovery, such as the legendary hoard of the Nibelungs.
Gold is permanent, and while some gets lost, much is melted down and reshaped over the ages. Thus what you are wearing around your finger, your wrist or your neck might be newly mined, or it could once have been an English Angel, Roman solidus, or the jewelry of an Egyptian lady. Interesting idea, isn't it...

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Cyberbeader