Symbol Dictionary: Metals
Gold: Gold has been associated with majesty, god, the sun, wealth, and immortality for many peoples. According to Rowena and Rupert Shepherd in their book 1000 Symbols: What Shapes Mean In Art And Myth (2002), “Gold is associated with divinity as it is incorruptible, neither rusting (like iron) nor tarnishing (like silver), and it is also purified by fire.” Gold was associated with immortality because it was incorruptible, and often the tree of life or its fruit was depicted as golden (including the Japanese tree-of-life on the paradise island Horaizan, and the Nordic golden apples of the heaven Asgard). Christians put gold into the mouths of the dead at their burial to insure immortality. Egyptians masked their royalty (who were divinely guided) with gold because they believed that a gods’ flesh was made of gold and their bones of silver; and their sun god Ra was strongly associated with gold. Christians also considered it a pure substance associated with God, majesty, and the sun. According to Symbols Of Church Seasons And Days (1997), by John Bradner, “Gold represents wealth and royalty. As a gift to the Christ Child it symbolizes his kingship.” Gold represents enlightenment in Buddhism, and the colors gold and yellow are sacred. In alchemy gold symbolizes enlightenment and the Great Work of turning a base-metal into gold was a metaphor for this enlightenment.
Silver: Silver symbolizes the moon, femininity, treachery and also associated with the gods and immortality, but to a lesser extent. According to Rowena and Rupert Shepherd in their book 1000 Symbols: What Shapes Mean In Art And Myth (2002), “In the Western Classical tradition, the Silver Age was the second age of mortals created by the greater god, Jupiter. The metal was associated with purity, femininity and the moon, to which it was linked because of its colour, and so it is sometimes represented by the moon’s glyph.” Alchemists also linked silver to the moon and femininity and the Lesser Work was the symbolic transformation of a base-metal into silver, metaphorically the feminine energies. In Egypt it was believed the bones of gods were made of silver. In Christianity silver represents treachery because Judas betrayed Christ with thirty silver pieces. As a form of currency, silver also represents wealth.
Copper: Copper rusts from a orange-brown color to a green, associating it with autumn in classical times. According to Rowena and Rupert Shepherd in their book 1000 Symbols: What Shapes Mean In Art And Myth (2002), “The colour green was thought sacred to Venus, so copper is linked to both the goddess and her planet and is sometimes represented using Venus’s glyph.” In China, the world for copper, tong, is synonymous with together, so it is placed on bridal beads as an affirmation of a long relationship.
Bronze: As a look-alike of gold, deities and ritual objects were made out of bronze in Buddhism, Hinduism, and by the Chinese.