The Asante, also known as Ashanti in English are part of the Akan ethnic group and are native to the Ashanti Region of modern-day Ghana. Gold was an integral component of Asante art and belief. Considered an earthly counterpart to the sun, it was the physical manifestation of life’s vital force, or “soul” (kra), and was incorporated into the ruler’s regalia to represent his purity and vigor. At the political level, gold indicated the kingdom’s dominance over rivals. Much gold entered the Asante court via tribute or war, and was worked there by artisans from conquered territories who introduced regional sculptural forms that were adopted for official use at the kingdom’s capital in Kumasi. The court’s sovereign power was further displayed through its regulation of the regional gold trade.

The king’s Golden Stool, which was, and remains, the primary symbol of the Asante nation, illustrates this precious metal’s cultural resonance. Court histories state that in 1701, as Osei Tutu was sitting beneath a tree, the Golden Stool descended from the sky and came to rest in his lap, a divine gesture in support of his rule. A wood form covered in gold sheets and hung with bells (to warn the ruler of impending danger), this artifact is no functional seat but rather a metaphor for the power of the Akan state. At court ceremonies, the stool is displayed on its own European-style chair set on a mat of elephant hide. As an icon of the Asante kingdom, it functions like a national flag, embodying the political and cultural soul of the nation.

Numerous art forms displayed at court were made of gold. Cast gold disks called akrafokonmu (“soul washer’s disk”) were protective emblems worn by important members of the court, including royal attendants known as akrafo, or “soul washers.” Individuals selected for this title were beautiful men and women born on the same day of the week as the king. They ritually purified and replenished the king’s, and thus the nation’s, vital powers. Another insignia of courtly power were afena, curved swords with distinctive gold-covered hilts and pommels worn by high-ranking individuals. An Akan sculpture of a seated chief from the Museum’s collection illustrates this emblem of power . Cast gold ornaments exhibiting imagery of political and martial supremacy dangled from sword hilts and scabbards enhanced the prestige of those who wore them. Finally, court linguists who acted as the king’s advisers and spokesmen carried gold-covered wooden staffs of office called kyeame poma. As early as the nineteenth century, these staffs displayed elaborately carved finials portraying political symbols and motifs from Akan proverbial lore.

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The kingdom of Lydia reigned over (present-day) western Turkey more than 2500 years ago. The region was a meeting point for traders coming from the East and the West, and Lydia grew fat from the profits of this trade. The kingdom was already wealthy with fertile land and natural resources, such as gold and silver found in the Pactolus River, as well as the production of fine textiles, and leather goods.

Some of the oldest coins in the world have been found in the region of the former empire and is believed to be the place where the coin was first metal coins were created. Likely minted in Sardia from about 550 BCE, the coins feature a lion, seen as a symbol of strength, and a bull, a symbol of virility – although the symbology is a point of some contention. The coins were minted from gold, with the two impressions punched into the blank coin. The “true gold” coins were minted from standardized purity and weight, making them the first bimetallic monetary system.

It is this feature, the standardized value of each coin, that is most important about the Lydian coins minted under King Croesus. Before Croesus, his father, King Alyattes, minted non-standardized coins from electrum – a naturally occurring alloy of gold and silver – that did not have a standardized value. While these coins were in circulation, it was the issuing of the Croeseid that changed the way that people did trade.

Why did people invent money?

Before coins, payments were made with bullion or by bartering. To determine the value of bullion it had to be weighed and tested for purity, a time-consuming and perhaps unreliable way for traders to make a profit. While touch tests were the basis for determining the purity of the precious metal, coinage removed the need for such a system with the innovation of the bimetallic monetary system.

Coins were introduced as a method of payment around the 6th or 5th century BCE, although there is some doubt as to the exact origin of the invention of coinage. The ancient Greek historian, Herodotus, contented that coins were first minted by the Lydians, while Aristotle claims that the first coins were minted by Damodice of Kyrme, the wife of King Midas of Phrygia. Many numismatists assert that the first coins were minted on the Greek island of Aegina, either by the local rulers or by King Pheidon of Argos.

What historians can agree on is that when Lydia was conquered by the Persians in 546 BCE, coins were in circulation, and Persia adopted the system. It was perhaps the first pricing metric innovation in history. The introduction of a coin with a royal guarantee not only sped up transactions but also introduced a more reliable value system.

The First Coins

The first electrum coins, issued by King Alyattes, were guaranteed by the crown to have a specific value. However, they were unreliable as the real value of each coin fluctuated greatly due to the variables in the alloy used to mint each coin. It wasn’t until a coin of consistent weight and purity was introduced that the innovation became a widely advantageous practice for trade.

Coins were not adopted in general trade immediately. Even the smallest-denomination electrum coins would have been too valuable for general use, where bartering was the normal practice. The first coins to be used for retailing were likely smaller silver fractions, Hemiobol, minted in Kyme (Aeolis) under Hermodike II (the Ionian Greeks) in the late 6th century BCE.

Of the electrum coins, the largest denomination found is a one-third slater (a Greek term for standard and applied to coinage) which weighed about 4.7 grams. It is believed that this coin, called a trite, was equivalent to the value of about 11 sheep or even as little as three jars of wine. No full slaters of electrum coins have ever been found. The electrum coins were minted in large quantities with thirds, sixths, and twelfths, as well as lion paw fractions. The denominations include a hekte (sixth), hemihekte (twelfth), and even a 1/96 slater, which weighs only about 0.15 grams, although numismatists disagree about whether the fractions below the twelfth were minted by Lydians.

Lydian Lion Design

The Lydian Lion is one of the most remarkable coins ever minted. It features the profile of a lion’s head, roaring with bared teeth and thick mane. The triangular eye gives the lion a powerful expression, while the significance of the starburst to the top right of the coin above the lion remains a point of much contention. The Lydian Lion features on the reverse an incuse punch created during the minting process. The hammer action forces the blank planchet into the anvil die. The trite features two squares that are joined or separate, created with two punches. The punch on smaller denominations consists of a single square.

There is more than one incarnation of the design, some with greater detail and others with larger starbursts, but the general design remained consistent throughout time, even as the minting of the first pure gold and silver coins took place.

The Fall of Lydia

While it is said that Croesus was a wealthy king and that Sardis was a beautiful city, the kingdom faced an abrupt defeat. In about 550 BCE, Croesus ordered the construction of the temple of Artemis at Ephesus, now known as one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, but he was defeated in battle at Halys by Cyrus II of Persia in 546 BC, and the Lydian kingdom was forced to become a Persian satrap.

Croesus was thrown to his death on a funeral pyre, but legend claims that the king was saved by Apollo and delivered to the land of the Hyperboreans.

Coins traveled through the many ancient empires, from the Greeks, the Romans, and the Persians to various parts of the world. Indo-Greek kingdoms often minted bilingual coins in the 2nd century BCE, while the most beautiful classical-era coins are said to have been minted by Samudragupta (335-376 CE), who portrayed himself as a conqueror and musician.

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So skilled were ancient artisans that not only are many of the techniques that were developed thousands of years ago still used today, some have even been lost to history, and nowhere is this more evident than in the masterpieces of ancient Egyptian art.

Metalworking in ancient Egypt can be dated back to the First Dynasty, c. 3150 – c. 2890 BCE. Little is known about this dynasty, which lasted only about 34 years. Narmer (sometimes called Menes) was the first true pharaoh of Egypt. He is credited with uniting Lower Egypt and Upper Egypt in what is believed to have been a prosperous reign – the Old Kingdom.

Where did the gold come from?

Egyptian gold was retrieved from alluvial deposits and quartz rock. There is geographical evidence of the exploitation of alluvial sands and gravels in the modern-day eastern desert region of Egypt and Northern Sudan.

What is not so clear is how the raw deposits were cleaned. Such gravels need to be washed before they are melted and the desert areas from which the deposits were extracted are a great distance from water sources. It is suspected that the gravel was carried across the vast desert landscape to the Nile for washing.

There is no evidence to show where or how the deposits were sourced and transported, this is speculation, but, there are hieroglyphics that depict the melting, casting, and working of gold. These reliefs, in the tomb of Mereruka (2300 BC), show the process of weighing the precious metal, smelting over a furnace, the creation of an ingot that is then beaten to a sheet, and the final crafting of the metal into elaborate pieces of jewelry. This artwork is an insight into the practical applications of goldsmithing at the time and shows that the same methods and techniques used today were also employed thousands of years ago.

One major difference, apart from technology, is also the quality of gold. There is no evidence that ancient Egyptians refined the precious metals they worked. Analysis of the many artworks found showing that there are great color and quality variances because of the wide range of impurities remaining in the ingots.

There is one gold that remains a mystery. It has a rose-pink film on the surface, of which scientists are yet to discover the origin. Gold was used as a medium for art, and it was exclusively for royals and powerful people in society. It was not used as a form of barter or currency, and so for this reason some of the variations and even techniques used by goldsmiths have long since been lost to time.

There is evidence that by as early as 2600 BCE, gold sheathing had been mastered, a technique little changed to this day. However, the most commonly applied technique of gilding shows how craftsmen adapted techniques and refined their work to create some of the most intricate pieces of gold art remaining to this day.

After hammering and crushing rock in mortars, gold dust was extracted from rock in a powder form before being melted into ingots. These ingots were then beaten into thin sheets, fixed to wooden or plaster walls and other structures that had already been carved with elaborate designs. The gold sheet was then beaten into place, leaving a raised impression of the design beneath. Goldsmiths were fast to learn that the thinner and finer the sheets, the easier it was to work. This technique was adopted and widely used, but one question remains – what was the adhesive used to secure the gold sheeting in place over the wooden and plaster structures? Science has yet to find an answer to this question.

Few examples of the ingenuity of Egyptian goldsmiths remain, and in some cases, researchers are left with more questions than answers. However, one discovery changed that, and we were given a close look at one young king and the riches he was adorned with as he entered the afterlife.

Hidden Treasures

In the tombs of Egyptian kings are found objects, and pieces of art, that were made wholly of gold, or were embellished with gold. Gold wire, statues, vessels, jewelry, and gold foil used to cover the openings of jars litter the inner chambers of leaders long forgotten to history.

Wealthy leaders were buried in tombs filled with all they would need in the afterlife, such as food, water, riches, horses, and slaves. The gold that was used to adorn the mean pieces of furniture, the coffins, the vessels, and the statues placed in the tombs often did not remain in the tomb for long.

Even before the unification of Egypt under Narmer, tomb raiding was commonplace. As early as the Early Dynastic Period (c. 3150 – c. 2613 BCE), tomb raiding was seen as a major issue. Thieves would steal into the tombs to remove the treasures within, trading the items on the black market with corrupt officials who would, likely, have accepted the pieces for a sack of grain or other commodities, have the piece melted down, then refashioned for their own collection. Precious metals were not used as currency at the time and the value of gold was in its artistic application. Hence, it was already wealthy leaders who accepted the stolen goods.

It was this raiding of tombs that influenced the intricate design of the pyramid complex of Djoser (c. 2670 BCE). The burial chamber was purposefully located, and the rooms and hallways of the tomb were filled with debris, to prevent thieves from entering the inner chamber. It didn’t work, and even the king’s mummy was stolen.

Located in a region set aside as a “gravesite”, the Valley of the Kings was a purpose-built site where kings would be safe from the greedy hands of thieves. The valley was populated with laborers who were there to build tombs from the rocks. They were to be well-rewarded for their work and so many people felt it was a privilege to be doing such work. However, supplies were scarce, often long-delayed and on arrival, of poor quality. People were far from Cairo and their families and the work was hard. It perhaps forced many workers to consider the rewards of tomb raiding well worth the risk of capture.

Looting was attractive because of the treasures that were buried with the dead. The gilded coffins, precious stones, imported artifacts, and jewelry were too tempting. Even the curses and debris-filled tombs were not enough to deter those who wanted to claim easy riches. It has also meant that much of the most precious and rare artifacts from the time have long since been lost. Great kings like Khufu or Thutmose III or Seti I or Ramesses II would have amassed huge wealth in their lifetimes, and the riches that were buried with them would have been some of the finest examples of master craftsmanship at the time, but we’ll never see them as they have long since disappeared, reworked into new forms.

King Tuts’ Tomb

It is fortunate then, that in 1922 CE, the English archaeologist and Egyptologist Howard Carter discovered the tomb of Tutankhamun in the Valley of the Kings, the most intact pharaoh’s tomb discovered. The tomb remained relatively intact, despite it having been broken into twice in antiquity and robbed. The tomb was accidentally buried by workers constructing the tomb of Ramesses VI (1145-1137 BCE) nearby. While it is unclear how this happened, it meant that Tutankhamun’s tomb disappeared and was forgotten for thousands of years. It was preserved without disturbance until the early 20th century when for the first time in 3,000 years, humans beheld the treasures of King Tutankhamun.

The young king died at only 19 years old. While for many years stories circulated about the cause of his early demise – a murderous wife, genetic illnesses, and even a hippo attack – it now seems that the most likely cause of his death was gangrene infection caused by a broken leg. The king was buried with many walking sticks and it is believed that he suffered many ailments that could have contributed to his early demise.

Tut’s small tomb was lost as builders covered the structure while constructing another tomb, and later built workers’ lodgings over the entranceway. Although the tomb had been robbed twice shortly after Tut’s internment, it was undisturbed and became a place of legend among archaeologists competing to make the discovery of the tomb.

Carter was the determined archaeologist who uncovered a treasure estimated to be worth about three-quarters of a billion dollars. Among the treasures, now relocated to a museum in Cairo, was Tutankhamun’s death mask, which is considered a masterpiece of Egyptian art.

Inside the Nest

Carter and his team entered the inner chamber in February 1923, to find a wall of ‘solid gold’, and uncovered the outermost coffin, the largest of three nested coffins inside which King Tutankhamun’s mummy was interred. The crafted wooden coffin covered in gold and semiprecious stones were only moved in 2019 to the Cairo museum for preservation. It is the last piece to be moved from the more than 3,000-year-old site. The second innermost coffin was similarly crafted from wood and covered in gold and semiprecious stones.

Chippings from the first sarcophagus reveal that it was made of cypress with a thin layer of gesso (a plaster-like substance) overlaid with gold foil. The gold layers vary in thickness from heavy sheet for the face and hands to the very finest gold leaf for the headdress. There is a  color variance in the gold work with the hands and face rendered in a paler alloy than the rest of the coffin. Carter said that this gave “an impression of the greyness of death.”

The outer coffin is adorned with rishi, a feather decoration executed in low relief. On the sides and superimposed upon this feathering are two finely engraved images of protective gods, Isis and Nephthys, with their wings extended. Their embrace, representing the goddesses’ guiding Egyptians through life and death, is alluded to in one of the two vertical lines of hieroglyphs running down the front of the lid. At the end, the coffin is another depiction of Isis, this time kneeling upon the hieroglyph for “gold”, and below this are 10 vertical columns of text.

The lid is carved in high relief with a recumbent image of the dead king as Osiris. He wears a broad collar and wrist ornaments carved in low relief, while his crossed arms, resting over his chest, clutch a crook (heqa Scepter) and a flail, the twin symbols of royal power at the time. The “Two Ladies”, Wadjet and Nekhbet, representing the divine cobra of Lower Egypt and the vulture goddess of Upper Egypt, rise from the king’s forehead. A small wreath tied around the pair was crafted from olive leaves and flowers bound to a strip of papyrus pith. The olive leaves were placed in an alternating pattern showing the green front and silver-black back of the leaves.

The Second Coffin

The second inner coffin is 2.04m long and was constructed from a still unidentified wood, covered in gold foil. The second coffin is more resplendent than the first, with extensive inlay woodwork. The carved wood was first overlaid with sheet gold on a thin layer of gesso, then narrow strips of gold were soldered to the base to form cells in which the small pieces of colored glass were secured using cement. The technique was used to create details, such as stripes on the nemes-headcloth (the striped head-cloth was typically worn by pharaohs in ancient Egypt), eyebrows, cosmetic eye lines, and a beard using lapis-blue glass. The uraeus (a stylized Egyptian cobra) on the forehead is wood-carved and gilded, with a head of blue faience and inlays of red, blue, and turquoise glass. The head of Nekhbet, the vulture, is also crafted of gilded wood with a beak of ebony. The eyes are laid in obsidian. The crook and flail are inlaid with lapis-blue and turquoise glass and blue faience, while a broad “falcon collar” containing inset pieces of brilliant red, blue and turquoise glass adorned the king’s throat. Two similarly designed bracelets are carved onto the wrists, matching the chest plate.

Rishi-pattern decorations cover the entire surface of the king’s body with feathers inlaid with jasper-red, lapis-blue, and turquoise glass. Images of the winged vulture goddess Nekhbet and the winged uraeus, Wadjet, embrace the coffin and are also inlaid with pieces of red, blue, and turquoise glass.

Inner Secrets

The innermost coffin is made of solid gold that, according to Carter’s writing, did not gleam. On excavation, after the linen shroud and papyrus collar were removed, it was revealed that the innermost coffin was covered “with a thick black pitch-like layer which extended from the hands down to the ankles,” according to Carter. This fatty resinous perfume poured over the coffin, filling the whole space between it and the base of the second coffin and making them solid and causing them to stick firmly together.

“This pitch like material hardened by age had to be removed by means of hammering, solvents, and heat, while the shells of the coffins were loosened from one another and extricated by means of great heat, the interior being temporarily protected during the process by zinc plates – the temperature employed though necessarily below the melting point of zinc was several hundred degrees Fahrenheit. After the inner coffin was extricated it had to be again treated with heat and solvents before the material could be completely removed.” – Howard Carter

The golden coffin, measuring 1.88m long, was beaten from heavy gold sheets with variable thickness ranging between 2.5mm and 3mm and weighed 110kg (3536.58 Troy ounces). An image of King Tut is sculpted on the coffin, including pupils of obsidian and calcite-white eyes and eyebrows and cosmetic lines inlaid with lapis-lazuli colored glass. The beard, also  inlaid with lapis colored glass, was crafted separately and later attached to the chin.

Interestingly, during this period of Egyptian history, males wore earrings only up until puberty. King Tut’s coffin reveals gold foil patches over the ear lobes to conceal that the ears, also cast separately, were pierced. Some historians have suggested that the young king’s early death was expected and that the crafting of his coffins began early in his life. Others argue that perhaps his death was sudden and artisans had to work quickly to adapt existing artworks in the image of the king.

Two heavy necklaces crafted from disc beads made in red and yellow gold and dark blue faience, threaded on glass bound with linen tape are found near the neck of the coffin. Each of the strings had lotus flower terminals inlaid with carnelian, lapis, and turquoise glass. Such adornments were typically awarded to military commanders and high officials for distinguished services to the Egyptian dynasty. Under the necklaces was the falcon collar of the coffin, again crafted separately from the lid, and inlaid with eleven rows of lapis, quartz, carnelian, felspar, and turquoise glass imitating tubular beadwork, with an outer edge of inlaid drops.

The king is laid in the same manner as the first and second coffins, with sheet bracelets inlaid in a similar manner to the collar using lapis, carnelian, and turquoise-colored glass. The crook and flail are overlaid with sheet gold, dark blue faience, polychrome glass, and carnelian. Much of the decoration of the flail’s shaft has decayed, likely because of the resin application. The goddesses, Nekhbet and Wadjet, made from gold sheet and inlaid with red-backed quartz and lapis and turquoise colored glass, spread their wings protectively around the upper body of the king, each grasping in their talons the hieroglyphic sign for “infinity”. The lid and base feature the images of the winged goddesses Isis and Nephthys on a rishi background. Like the outermost coffin, this innermost sarcophagus was fitted with handles attached using eight gold tongues, four on each side, which dropped into sockets in the shell and were retained by gold pins. Because the available space between the two coffins was so narrow, these pins had to be removed piecemeal.

The Death Mask

Beneath all the intricate work of the three coffins was discovered one of the most well-known Egyptian artworks of our time. Tutankhamun’s funerary mask.

The funerary mask would originally have rested on the shoulders of the mummy inside the innermost gold coffin. It is constructed of two sheets of gold that were hammered together and weighs 10.23kg (321.5 Troy ounces). Tutankhamen is depicted wearing the striped nemes headdress with the goddesses Nekhbet and Wadjet protecting his brow. He wears the false beard and a broad collar, which ends in terminals shaped as falcon heads. The back of the mask is covered with Spell 151b from the “Book of the Dead”, written in hieroglyphs. The book was used by Egyptians as a map for the afterlife, and this particular spell protects Tutankhamun’s limbs as he moves into the underworld. This gives greater credence to the theory that the young king died of gangrene as the result of a broken leg.

Art Over Profit

X-ray crystallography shows that the mask contains two alloys of gold: a lighter 18.4 karat shade for the face and neck, and 22.5 karat gold for the rest of the mask. Gold was commonly used to make jewelry and ornaments for two main reasons: the Egyptians believed that gold is the flesh of the sun god, Ra, and secondly because gold was plentiful in the region. Most of the techniques that goldsmiths developed more than 3,000 years ago are still used today, and many of them little changed by the influence of time and technology.

Ancient Egyptian art is some of the finest and delicate working of gold, particularly unrefined gold, in the world, and thanks to an accident of time, King Tut’s tomb continues to be a source of discovery for gold application, workmanship, and adaptation.

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What Is a Troy Ounce?

Troy weight can be traced back to trade in the 9th century France, where English merchants described the weight of a platter traded in the French town of Troyes. However, the exact etymology of the weight is unknown, as a reference in a ledger from 1307 also contains a translation of the word “troi”, which meant balance.

What is certain is that the Troy weight system is closely related to that of the Roman monetary system. The Romans used bronze bars of varying weights as currency.

• An aes grave, or heavy bronze, weighed 1 pound
• 1/12 of an aes grave was called an uncia, or an ounce, in English

Various regions of Europe adopted their own troy weight systems, including the Holland troy and the Paris troy, which had values varying by up to several percentage points. In 5727, England made the troy weight system its official measure for gold and silver, which remained in place up until 1824 when the crown introduced the British Imperial system of weights and measures.

The sanctioning of the measure by the UK crown meant that the measure became standardized, and much of the world’s precious metals are measured using this metric today, with China being the exception, as gold in the region is measured in Chinese Gold Panda’s, a bullion coinage introduced in 1982.

The troy ounce – often abbreviated as “t oz” or “oz t” – used today is essentially the same as the British Imperial troy ounce, which was adopted as an official weight standard for United States coinage by Act of Congress on May 19, 1828. The British Imperial troy ounce was officially adopted for coinage in 1527, making the beginnings of standardized measures for precious metals, and later coins, in the European region. The system was used to measure more than just metals and had applications in medicine, food storage, and materials.

The only troy weight still in use is the British Imperial troy ounce and its American counterpart. Both are based on a grain of 0.06479891 grams (exact, by definition), with 480 grains to a troy ounce (compared with ​437 1⁄2 grains for an ounce avoirdupois – which means “goods of weight” and was formally used to weigh precious metal and non-precious metal items). While the British Empire abolished the 12-ounce troy pound in the 19th century, it is still sometimes used in the American system.

The troy ounce continues to be the standard unit of measurement in the precious metals market to ensure purity standards and other common measures remain consistent.

• The troy ounce is the equivalent of 31.1034768 grams, whereas the ounce is the equivalent of 28.349 grams
• A troy pound (12 troy ounces) is lighter than a standard pound (14.6 troy ounces)

The avoirdupois ounce, or the ounce (oz), is a metric commonly used in the US to measure foods and other items, but not precious metals. It is the equivalent of 28.349 grams or 437.5 grains. A troy ounce is a little heavier, with a gram equivalent of 31.1 grams. The difference is just 2.751 grams, but this can add up to a substantial amount in large quantities.

When gold is trading at US$1,887/ounce, the ounce measurement is a troy ounce.

• A troy ounce is heavier than a standard ounce, there are 14.6 troy ounces — compared to 16 standard ounces — in one pound.
• This pound is not to be confused with a troy pound, which is lighter and is made up of 12-troy ounces.

For those wanting to invest in precious metals and trading, it is important to understand these metrics. There are a few other terms that can be very useful to the market newcomer.

Hundredweight (Cwt)

Formerly also known as the centum weight or quintal, the hundredweight is a British imperial and US customary unit of weight or mass. In North America, a hundredweight is equal to 100 pounds; in the United Kingdom, a hundredweight is 112 pounds. It has largely been replaced by units of kilograms.

Precious Metals 

Precious metals are rare metals that have a high economic value, such as gold, silver, and platinum. Each has an ISO 4217 currency code.

Demurrage 

Demurrage fees are the fees paid by freighters for delays in loading or unloading freight.

Concerning currencies and commodities, demurrage refers to the costs of holding those assets.

New York Mercantile Exchange (NYMEX)

The New York Mercantile Exchange is a commodity futures exchange owned and operated by CME Group of Chicago. It is the world’s largest physical commodity futures exchange.

Vault Receipt

A vault receipt, or a warehouse receipt, is your guarantee that a seller will deliver commodities to a certain warehouse for storage. A vault receipt is commonly used to settle a precious metals futures contract, in place of actual delivery.

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