Gold fever: dazzling lustre of yellow metal - PHOTOS

Sought after since the beginning of recorded history, gold remains a highly valued metal, reaching record highs recently, climbing over 135% in value in the past year alone.

The recent rise in the price of gold comes just as annual worldwide mine production has decreased - down by nearly 8% since 2001.

In human history, only 161,000 tons of gold have been mined - more than half of that extracted in just the past 50 years.

Collected here are a handful of recent photographs of people searching for, mining, rediscovering, celebrating, buying and selling gold.

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Photos by Boston Pictures