Worshipful companies and livery halls

Title

Worshipful companies and livery halls

Genre

Interview; Documentary

TX Date

3 Nov 1985

Year of production

1985

Play audio

To listen to the audio files, please log in.

Duration

00:24:08

Description

Series: Worshipful Companies and Livery Halls. Programme 7: Goldsmiths’ Hall. Richard Robbins explores the Company of Goldsmiths, where gold articles are tested and hallmarked. He talks about gold as the currency of the world, and Librarian Susan Hare explains the history of the company, why it was introduced and what it does. Rosemary Ransome Wallace, the curator, discusses some of the pieces on show, and talks through the history and process of the assay. Testers of the gold describe the testing process, and staff discuss their work. The assay offices of the country are mentioned, including the emblems the different offices use to hallmark the gold.

Contributors

Richard Robbins; Rosemary Ransome Wallace; Susan Hare

Keywords

London; Customs and traditions; Trade guilds; Halls; Worshipful Company of Goldsmiths; Gold industry; Gold; Goldsmiths; Goldsmiths’ Hall; Emblems; Hallmarking

The copyright of audio recordings in the LBC / IRN Digitisation Archive is owned by Global Radio UK Ltd.