GOLD-BEATERS are artisans, who, by beating with a hammer, on a marble, gold and silver in moulds of vellum and bullocks' guts, reduce them to thin leaves fit for gilding or silvering copper, iron, steel, wood, and other materials. Gold-beaters differ from flatteners of gold or silver; for the former bring their metal into leaves by the hammer, whereas the latter only flatten it by pressing it through a mill preparatory to beating.
There are also TIN-BEATERS employed in the looking-glass trade, whose business it is to beat tin on large blocks of marble till it be reduced to thin leaves fit to be applied with quicksilver in preparing looking-glasses.