Gold Leaf

Gold leaf has been used for the decoration of tombs and statues, cathedrals and temples, fine books and picture frames since Egyptian times.

It is still often preferred for adorning the domes or ceilings of public buildings because its resistance to corrosion means it will outlast paint by many years. Examples include the Canadian Houses of Parliament in Ottawa and the State Capitol in Denver, Colorado, the Metropolitan Opera House in New York and Napoleon’s tomb in Paris.

The craft of beating gold into a wafer-thin leaf only seventy-five millionths of a millimetre (three millionths of an inch) thick evolved in antiquity because it required neither heat nor mechanical devices. Many mummies and their cases in Egyptian tombs, such as King Tutankhamun’s in 1352 BC, were overlaid with gold leaf as fine as any made today.


Gold leaf outlasts paint by many years
on the roofs and ceilings of public
buildings (Credit: Timothy Green)

The technique of gold beating has changed little. The gold beater stands before a granite block set on a block of wood or tree trunk in the ground; the resiliency of the wood base gives bounce and rhythm to his hammering. Gold is initially rolled into ribbons twenty-five thousandths of a millimetre (one thousandth of an inch) thick, then cut into 3.175 centimetres (1¼ inch) squares and placed in squares of seaweed paper, encased in turn in parchment paper. This packet, called a ‘cutch’, is beaten with a ten kilogram (seventeen pound) hammer until the gold is in ten centimetre (four inch) squares.

These are then placed on ox skins, coated with brime, a powder-like substance made from volcanic ash, brushed on with the hind leg of a Russian hare. This new packet, a ‘shoder’, is beaten for two hours with a four kilogram (nine pound) hammer, then divided again into a ‘mould’ wrapped in parchment, which is beaten with a three kilogram (seven pound) hammer. In all, 82,800 blows are necessary to reduce the gold to seventy-five millionths of a millimetre (three millionths of an inch) thickness. The gold is then so delicate that it can be cut only with a malacca reed shaped into a cutting tool or ‘wagon’ which is slid across the gold.

Today, only a handful of craftsmen in Britain, France and the USA still practice the technique.