Before there was history, there was gold. Layer on layer of myth and legend imbue the metal today.
This scant few centuries in the chart above depict pretty much its similar price progress over the millenia--long periods of no change interspersed with shorter periods of dramatic price moves.
Two of the sudden, continuous spikes upward in the last century have been due to government mandate. In 1933, President (USA) Roosevelt's Executive Order 6102 confiscated all private gold, giving the population 26 days to turn it in or face heavy fines and/or up to 10 year in prison.
In 1971 President Nixon unilaterally directed the U.S. Treasury to permanently suspend redemption of paper currency into gold on request, an international system that had been agreed to and set up by 44 nations at the end of World War II.
The chief power in the state, King, Pharaoh, Dictator, President, decides what gold is worth, and more powerfully, when and who
may own it and who may not.
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