Abstract
Man discovered gold in the course of the fifth millenium B.C., a time when there was a new curiosity towards minerals and coloured stones, coinciding with the major technological step of the extraction of copper carbonates. In Europe this was especially developed in the metallurgical environment of the Balkans (Mohen and Eluère 1991). A fuller use of gold spread during the Copper Age, and developed and expanded during the Bronze Age, a time characterized by craft specialisation, a more defined sense of social class, as well as by long distance travel and trade, and strong religious beliefs. Later, during the Iron Age, gold would serve to enhance the power of princes, before a new age arose with the earliest coinages (Eluère 1987).
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© 1995 Kluwer Academic Publishers
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Eluere, C. (1995). Gold and Society in Prehistoric Europe. In: Morteani, G., Northover, J.P. (eds) Prehistoric Gold in Europe. NATO ASI Series, vol 280. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-015-1292-3_4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-015-1292-3_4
Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht
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