Before I go to the differentiating the pure gold to gold alloy, let me give some brief information about its history.

Ancient History Of Gold

Historians say that the human fascination of gold is as old as the history, it only means that Gold maybe the first valuable element that is discovered in history. Although it is not stated when was the first man discovered the gold and had an interest in it. An artifacts found in the caves confirms that people during Paleolithic age uses the kind of metal. Little did they know, now it is used for comparison between the rich and the impoverished one.

The first certain evidence the gold is widely used is around 3,000 B.C. in Egypt. Gold played a major role in ancient Egyptian mythology, it is used to adorned and fancy the Pharaohs and even the temple priests. In fact, one of the huge evidence of gold usage is the capstones on the Pyramid of Giza. They are also the first people who used gold as currency exchange ratio, until such time they use it also making golden maps describing the maps of gold mines and various gold deposits.

Funerary Mask of Psusennes I

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King Tutankhamun's Gold Throne

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King Tutankhamun's Death Mask

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Until during 1792, United States Congress mandate the Mint and Coinage Act and established a fixed price of gold in terms of U.S. dollars. It became legal tender in the United States, just a few years later the gold dollar was used as the standard unit of account in the United States. You can see at the Periodic Table; gold belongs to the coinage metals (Group 11) due to their former usage.

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Fast forward to the Modern day, when no countries in the world use gold as standard, as of year 2014 no currency in the world is backed by gold. The last currency to use a gold as a standard was the Swiss Franc, which used 40% gold reserve until the year 2000.

Why is Gold valuable?

Scarcity. Gold, aside from difficult to extract; it is also hard to find. Example of this is only about 2,000 tons of gold are created per year while 10,500 tons of steel is produced every hour.

Physical Characteristics. Gold has remarkable physical characteristics: it is a great example for excellent conductor of electricity. To add it is not comparable to any metal with its malleability and ductility. In fact, an ounce of gold can be stretch into 50 miles long of wire. While gold plated copper requires an ounce of gold to plate a 1,000-mile-long of thread. One of the best example of illustration of very malleable a gold is can be found inside the Toi Museum, Japan

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Aesthetic attributes. Its unique coloring and luster have captivated humans for millennia. Over time, rulers have loved showing-off gold in their thrones, crowns, tombs, or simply wearing it.

Wealth storage. Simple, gold never runs out its value! As wise old saying, Second-hand gold is as good as new.

Now we’re here to the real topic of my blog…

When can you say the Gold you are holding is the 24 karat one?

Gold has different karats 24k, 22k, 18k, 14k, 12K and 10k gold. Karat means a basic unit to measure the purity of gold. The higher value of a karat number, the purer the gold it gets.

24K Gold: When you say 24k gold it is the purest one or the 100% gold substance, without any plated metal traces. When some says he’s selling a 25k gold then you must know, that thing doesn’t exist. However, 24k gold isn’t used for jewelry; it has a lesser density compare to the less karat. Being the purest form of gold this also means that it is more expensive than any other karat.

When you encounter such word as Gold Alloy, this only means Gold Plated Alloys.

An alloy means a composition of two or more metals together. One of the basic metals partnered with gold is: Silver, Zinc, Nickel, Copper and many others. This composition of metals makes a gold durable; thus it is best suited for making a jewelry. Below are the best examples of gold alloys:

22K Gold: A 22k gold means 91.67% pure gold and the other 8.33% goes to the combined metal. The metals mentioned above are the examples of good composition for making a precious jewelry. But even if it is durable, it is still not preferable for diamonds or heavily studded jewelry.

18K Gold: The gold here has a 75% composition while the rest of the percentage goes to the metals like copper or silver etc. It means 18 parts gold and 6 parts goes to the other metal(s). Aside from it is less expensive from other karats, it is best suited for heavy studded jewelry, like crowns, staff or any other diamond studded jewelries.

14K Gold: This gold jewelry composes of 14 parts of gold and the rest goes to the metal alloys or a metal, making it 58.3% gold.

12K Gold: this is the 50/50 gold alloy; 12 parts of gold and 50 parts to alloys or a metal.

10K Gold: A 10k Gold is the least composition of gold US and Canada considered as a gold for. This makes a 10 parts of gold and 14 parts goes to alloys or a metal, making it 41.7% gold.

9K Gold: Europe still consider this as a least gold alloy that a jewelry should have. In fact, it is very trendy in their country now a day. This only means 9 parts are gold and the other parts goes to other metal or alloys.

The Different Colors of Gold

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24K gold has the natural color a gold should have; it appears as metallic yellow or reddish yellow, the color cannot be changed unless it is mixed with other alloys or metal. Below are the other classifications of Gold:

Pink & Rose Gold: it is made by a composition of adding more copper into the gold to make it pink-colored substance.

Green Gold. Composes by adding more silver to make a green color combination.

White Gold. It is achieved by adding nickel or palladium (platinum) to the alloy composition.

Yellow Gold. If it’s yellow you should know that it cannot be always consider as 24 karat gold, a pure gold is very soft anyway. Hence, even a standard yellow gold is made up of alloys.

Metallurgists fine-tune their recipes to make a combination of gold which could be attractive, durable, and can be made into a jewelry. There’s more color and metal combination that is applicable to make a gold jewelry, but the above examples are a good composition to make a valuable jewelry and wearable.

This will be all for now guys, next time you may question yourself how well did you know about gold? Such a common metal but a very broad to discuss. Below is my recent post:
Clash of Reds: Ruby Or Garnet?

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Love,
Unicorn-Girl

References:

http://www.peridot.com/types-of-gold/
https://www.thespruce.com/how-to-buy-gold-jewelry-2043645
https://bebusinessed.com/history/the-history-of-gold/
http://www.mygoldguide.in/gold-purity-tips-difference-between-24k-22k-18k-gold