Adit:
A level driven into a mine from the side of a hill.
Alluvial Deposit: A deposit formed by material washed down or transported by water, found in sand or gravel.
Auriferous;Gold-bearing.
Bar:A hard ridge of rock or gravel crossing a stream.
Battery:A number of stamps for crushing and pulverising ore or rock.
Bedrock or Bottom:Rock, sandstone, or clay on which the best gold deposits are found. See also False Bottom.
Black sand:Magnetic iron, titanic iron, tin, manganese, or other fine, black, heavy sand accompanying gold.
Bonanza:A rich deposit of gold.
Buck:A large quartz reef in which there was little or no gold.
Bullion:Uncoined gold or silver, or bars of silver or gold.
Carat:A term to distinguish the fineness of gold alloy, meaning one twenty-fourth. Fine gold is 24 carat; 18 carat means 18 parts of pure gold and 6 of some other metal.
Claims:Ground on which the Crown grants the exclusive rights of mining. Worthless claims or grounds were called schicers or duffers. Those yielding up to 3 oz per week per man were known as ‘tucker’ claims, up to 8oz per week were known as ‘wages’ claims, above 8oz were known as ‘pilers’, the richest of all were known as ‘Homeward-bounders’.
Colour:Specks of gold visible in the prospector’s pan or in a sample of quartz.
Cradle:A box on rockers for treating wash-dirt for gold.
Crevicing:Collecting gold from the crevices or cracks in rocks.
Drive:A horizontal tunnel
Duffer:No gold, see Claims.
Duffered out:All the gold has been mined.
Face:End of a tunnel, or edge of a terrace being sluiced.
False Bottom:A bottom on which the gold has been deposited above the true bottom.
Flour gold:The finest of gold dust.
Flume:A wooden channel constructed on trestles to carry water.
Fools gold:Iron pyrites, which being of a brassy yellow colour was often mistaken for gold.
Fossicker:A part time miner, one who works creek beds or other places but does not hold a registered claim.
Grubstaking:When storekeepers or others would give creditduring the deal time of preparing a claim for gold production. This work sometimes took months.
At the grassroots:Gold on the surface of the ground.
Hatter:A solitary miner, working on his own account.
Headrace:The upper part of the water race, where the gold is trapped.
Haymaking:Working a sea beach claim.
Jeweller’s shop:A very rich patch in a gold mine.
Joe / Joe’d:To be called a Joe was to be ridiculed or laughed at. An Australian expression.
Jumping on a claim:Taking possession of a mining claim alleged to be forfeited or abandoned.
Jump up:In a drive or tunnel, a shaft rising above the tunnel.
Lode:A mineral vein containing ore, also called a vein.
Long Tom:A sluice box, Californian in origin.
Miner’s Right:A licence which allowed the digger or prospector to peg out a claim. It cost £1 and was effective for 1 year.
Nugget:A large piece of alluvial gold, as distinct from a lump of gold embedded in solid rock.
Open cast or open out:A surface working, open to daylight.
Ounce:The twelfth part of a pound troy and sixteenth part of a pound avoirdupois. Gold is reckoned in troy weight.
Paddock:To work in an area of a certain size. To paddock wash-dirt, that is, hold it in a bin, until water is available for washing.
Paydirt:Auriferous gravel or sand.
Pennyweight:Twenty four grains or one twentieth of an ounce troy. The abbreviation is dwt, from denarius – weight from which the symbol ‘d’ for a penny is derived.
Pilers:See Claims.
Placer:Alluvial deposit.
Race:An aqueduct or channel for conducting water to or from the place where it performs work. The former is called the head race, the latter the tail race.
Riffles or ripples:Bars or cleats at the bottom of a sluice box to catch the gold. ‘Riffle’ seems to have been Californian term and was used in alluvial gold working. ‘Ripple’ was apparently of Australian origin and was applied in connection with the amalgamating tables of quartz batteries.
Salting a mine:Introducing gold or other minerals, to deceive prospective purchasers.
Shaft:A vertical or inclined tunnel from the surface into a mine.
Schicer:See Claims.
Shift:The time during which men work in a mine; also the gang of men working for that period.
Sluicing:Washing auriferous earth through long races or boxes provided with riffles.
Sluice headIn New Zealand a stream of water capable of discharging 60 cubic feet per minute.
Stamp:The weighted head for crushing ore at a battery.
Strike:A find made in an unexpected manner.
Sump:A digger’s roll of blankets, in which he carried his spare clothes, food and other possessions.
Tailings:Refuse from workings after the ore has been extracted.
Ton: A long ton was 2240 pounds, a short ton 2000 pounds.
Tucker ground:Poor ground, just rich enough to allow the minerto buy the necessities of life.
To set into work:Preparation of the claim is completed and all is ready for the recovery of gold.
Washdirt:Auriferous gravel, sand, clay or cement.
