Good morning, friends. We already have the hyphenated word “gold-plated” (which see for a discussion of its hyphenatedness) (hyphenatiation?) (hyphenatitude?)

We also have “gild“, and I’m all excited because the podcast which I adore, The History of English Podcast by Kevin Stroud, sometimes uses “gold” and “gild” and “geld” to be examples of various word-importing and word-change principles. Naturally I have turned this morning to the OED to get my golden ducks in a row… Oh, my sweet word. Not only does the etymology range from Scotland to India (with a magnificent side-track at the archaic word “blee”, which means color or hue), but the earliest example quotations include lines from the Ormulum and Layamon’s Brut, which texts Dr. Stroud has examined deeply in different episodes. I’m just fanning myself.

• 1.026 tucked into a golden belt,
• 1.043 and gold
• 1.046 in their gold
• 1.070 It was a beautiful golden harp,
• 1.073 To seek the pale enchanted gold.
• 1.075 There many a gleaming golden hoard
• 1.077 To claim our long-forgotten gold.
• 1.078 And harps of gold; where no man delves
• 1.082 To win our harps and gold from him!
• 1.119 I mean about the gold
• 1.122 and in addition I believe they found a good deal of gold
• 1.123 Dragons steal gold
• 1.123 and gold was probably getting scarce up there,
• 1.124 here Thorin stroked the gold chain round his neck –
• 1.144 To find our long-forgotten gold.
• 2.113 to pots full of gold coins standing
• 2.117 and carried away the pots of gold,
• 3.040 and their love of gold,
• 5.040 Yet golden treasure inside is hid,
• 5.084 a golden ring,
• 7.009 and wore a golden crown,
• 7.009 and his fifteen chieftains golden collars
• 7.009 (made of the gold that the dwarves gave them)
• 7.027 shone like fiery gold.
• 7.045 and fell golden on the garden full of flowers that came right up to the steps.
• 7.095 They spoke most of gold
• 7.095 there were no things of gold or silver
• 7.132 and till evening it lay golden on the land about them.
• 8.071 sat a woodland king with a crown of leaves upon his golden hair,
• 8.133 for the elf-king had bargained with them to shape his raw gold
• 8.133 and also he was determined that no word of gold or jewels
• 10.007 and some were filled with gold
• 10.008 and gold would flow
• 10.010 but you could only have told it by his golden chain,
• 10.020 The gold gleamed on his neck
• 10.021 as if they expected the Mountain to go golden
• 10.034 to cargoes and gold,
• 10.035 His halls shall echo golden
• 10.035 And the rivers golden run.
• 12.013 gold wrought
• 12.014 and fragments of gold from his long lying on his costly bed.
• 12.015 at the gold beyond price
• 12.032 and he went back to his golden couch to sleep –
• 12.065 Not gold alone brought us hither.’
• 12.066 in these parts besides my gold.
• 12.067 even if you could steal the gold bit by bit –
• 12.070 that gold was only an afterthought with us.
• 12.096 with cunning gold,
• 12.096 the great golden cup of Thror,
• 13.018 as he stumbled on some golden thing.
• 13.032 is wakened by gold
• 13.034 and finding still hanging there many golden harps
• 13.040 We are not looking for gold yet,
• 13.048 and beams of gold fell
• 14.005 is forging gold,’
• 14.008 and the northern end of the lake turned golden.
• 14.008 his rivers golden run!
• 14.008 The river is running gold from the Mountain!’
• 14.033 What sort of gold have they sent down the river to reward us?
• 14.035 and filled with golden bells,
• 14.043 to his golden bed,
• 15.020 in gold.
• 15.021 But none of our gold shall thieves take
• 15.037 The heart is bold that looks on gold;
• 15.041 and gold.
• 15.049 with the power that gold has
• 15.058 but we leave you to your gold.
• 16.002 is worth more than a river of gold
• 16.027 he is quite ready to sit on a heap of gold
• 16.037 He values it above a river of gold.
• 17.006 for which you would yield any of your gold?’
• 17.019 and gold,
• 17.021 What about the gold
• 17.034 He was determined to wait until the gold
• 17.035 but they found no gold or payment.
• 17.037 ere I begin this war for gold.
• 17.055 In the gloom the great dwarf gleamed like gold
• 18.017 Since I leave now all gold
• 18.018 and not a mountain of gold can amend it.
• 18.019 above hoarded gold,
• 18.027 Dain has crowned their chief with gold,
• 18.033 Yet a fourteenth share of all the silver and gold,
• 18.034 From that treasure Bard sent much gold
• 18.037 and the other with gold,
• 19.003 Than gold won by mining,
• 19.025 they found the gold of the trolls,
• 19.027 So they put the gold
• 19.039 His gold
• 19.042 (and had real gold buttons)
• 19.044 Bard had given him much gold
• 19.044 and took most of the gold
• 19.045 in his day the rivers run with gold.’

“gold, n.1 and adj.” OED Online, Oxford University Press, September 2019, http://www.oed.com/view/Entry/79763. Accessed 4 October 2019.