An Etymological Dictionary of Astronomy and Astrophysics

A yellow, → ductile  → metal which occurs naturally in veins and alluvial deposits associated with → quartz or → pyrite; symbol Au (L. aurum “shining dawn”). → Atomic number 79; → atomic weight 196.9665; → melting point 1,064.43 °C; → boiling point 2,808 °C; → specific gravity 19.32 at 20 °C.

Like other → chemical elements the gold found on Earth has an → interstellar origin. However, the new-born Earth was too hot and most of the molten gold, mixed with → iron, sank to its center to make the core during the first tens of millions of years. The removal of gold to the → Earth’s core should have left the Earth’s crust
depleted of gold. Nevertheless, the precious metal is tens to thousands of times more abundant in the → Earth’s mantle than predicted. One explanation for this over-abundance is the → Late Heavy Bombardment. Several hundred million years after the core formation a flux of → meteorites enriched the → Earth’s crust with gold (Willbold et al., 2011, Nature 477, 195).

Etymology (EN): M.E., from O.E. gold, from P.Gmc. *gulth- (cf. O.H.G. gold, Ger. Gold, Du. goud, Dan. guld, Goth. gulþ), from PIE base *ghel-/*ghol- “yellow, green;” cf. Mod.Pers. zarr “gold,” see below.

Etymology (PE): Talâ “gold,” variants tala, tali.
Zarr “gold;” Mid.Pers. zarr; Av. zaranya-, zarənu- “gold;” O.Pers. daraniya- “gold;” cf. Skt. hiranya- “gold;” also Av. zaray-, zairi- “yellow, green;” Mod.Pers. zard “yellow;” Skt. hari- “yellow, green;” Gk. khloe literally “young green shoot;” L. helvus “yellowish, bay;” Rus. zeltyj “yellow;” P.Gmc. *gelwaz; Du. geel; Ger. gelb; E. yellow.