Wikipedia
Assay offices are institutions set up to assay (test the purity of) precious metals, in order to protect consumers. Upon successful completion of an assay, (i.e. if the metallurgical content is found to be equal or better than that claimed by the maker and it otherwise conforms to the prevailing law) the assay offices typically stamp a hallmark, punze, or poinçon on the item to certify its metallurgical content. Hallmarking first appeared in France, with the Goldsmiths' Statute of 1260 promulgated under Etienne Boileau, Provost of Paris, for King Louis IX.
The Assay Office is a historic building at 210 Main Street in Boise, Idaho. It is significant for its role in the history of mining in Idaho, and was the first major federal government building in the Idaho Territory. During the first half of the 1860s, Idaho’s gold production was the third highest in the nation. Due to the difficulty of transporting bulky, heavy ores the long distance to the nearest U.S. Mint in San Francisco, there was great demand for an assaying office in Idaho. Gold and other precious metals are not mined in a pure form. In order to place a value on an ore, the precious metal must be separated from the impurities. This is what an assay office does.
Usage examples of "assay office".
He took a little jig step on his way back from the Assay office, and on helldeck nobody took exception to a little exuberance—.
Bringing the latinum onto the station had its own problems-making sure that the route to the assay office and back was secure for one thing-but it was to Odo's mind (and Steyn's, in time, once Odo had finished his explanations) without doubt the better choice.
I'm headin' for Furnace Crick to ship my ore samples to an assay office, and pick up supplies.
She indicated a row of them hanging on a small rail near the assay office.
Ro yawned as she passed the Replimat and the florist to her left, and the assay office and an empty storefront—.
Across the street was an assay office, and farther down were other buildings, all of frame or log construction.
There was an assay office where the harness shop had been, and a new general store across from the one Eli Patterson had owned.
Miller Pine, who had been a chemist before he became an actor, had opened an assay office, and it was now the last building on the street.
But look, right now here's the gemological analysis unit from the assay office.
I could go to the Royal Assay Office to check the provenance of the temple coinage or I could go to the Dream Quarter after Magister Peridont and the answer to a question that had nagged me since I’.
I stood there under the Assay Office for a while doing exercises, lifts and stretches.
There was a refueling station, a shipping depot, an assay office for mining claims in all the neighboring systems, a postal forwarding station for the worlds deeper into the Frontier, a single small city that had evolved from a Tradertown, a huge freshwater sea, and a few enormous totally-automated farms operated by robots laboring under the watchful eye of a tiny handful of human overseers.
Corral was on Fourth Street, right between Fly's Photo Studio and a mineral assay office.
How Martel stumbled on a vein this rich I don't know, but the point is that unless he takes the gold down the far side of the Tessellate Mountains, he has to run it through the assay office in either Plat City or Rand, and he's too cautious not to have installed at least one listening ear in each city's police department.