Goldbeating

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. The craft of meticulously hammering gold into very thin sheets for artistic purposes is essential in traditional decoration techniques
2. This specialized art involves flattening gold into delicate layers, often used in fine art and gilding
3. The technique of carefully pounding gold until it forms extremely thin sheets used in decoration and art

Etymology: Goldbeating is one of the few English compounds where the two parts are exactly what they appear to be: "gold" and "beating", the latter a gerund of "beat" in the sense of hammering metal into a thin sheet. The craft is old, and the word's literal sense is simply the act of hammering gold until it spreads out into leaf so thin that light passes through it. The compound works the same way as "goldsmith" or "silversmith", where a precious metal is joined to a word for the work done on it. Gold is unusually suited to the process because it is extremely malleable: a small quantity can be hammered over a large area, with gold beaters traditionally interleaving the metal between sheets of animal membrane so it does not stick or tear under the blows.

Synonyms: gold leafing