from αμμος sand, and χρυσος gold, a name given by authors to a stone very common in Germany, and apparently composed of a golden sand. It is of a yellow gold-like colour, and its particles are very glossy, being all fragments of a coloured talc. It is usually so soft as to be easily rubbed to a powder in the hand; sometimes it requires grinding to powder in a mortar, or otherwise. It is used only as sand to strew over writing. There is another kind of it less common, but much more beautiful, consisting of the same sort of glossy spangles; not however of a gold colour, but of a bright red like vermilion.