7.3: Mixture Problems MAT.ALG.

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SOLUTION: The Golden Crown

Question: Now let’s examine the role of linear equations in this purity assessment. Let’s assume
that the king gave 500 grams of gold to the goldsmith, and the goldsmith crafted a 500-gram
crown. Archimedes determined the volume of the crown to be 9050 cubic centimeters, and he
knew that densities of gold and silver are 19 g/cm3 and 10 g/cm3, respectively. How many grams
of silver, if any, were used to replace gold in the crown?

Answer:

Let the crown consist of x grams of gold and y grams of silver.

Since the total weight is 500 grams, we can write the equation:

x+ y=500

Since density of gold is 19 g/cm3, the volume of x grams of gold is 19x cm3. Similarly, the
volume of y grams of silver is 10y cm3.

The total volume of the crown was found to be 9050 cm3. Therefore, we can write the equation:

19 x +10 y=9050

Now we have two equations in two unknowns.

We can rewrite the first equation as x=500− y and substitute this into the second equation:

19( 500− y )+10 y=9050

y=50

Therefore, the crown contained 50 grams of silver.