Platinum
Physically, platinum is heavy, soft, malleable (easy to work—only silver and gold are easier to shape), ductile (easy to draw into wires), and has a fairly high melting point (~1770°C or 3220°F). Chemically, it's often described as a noble metal because it is so unreactive. It doesn't even react with oxygen in the air so it doesn't rust or tarnish. It's also reasonably resistant to attack from acids. Although platinum earned its name only in the 18th century, platinum metals (and alloys rich in platinum) were known in ancient times. Platinum is thought to have been described for the first time in 1557 by Italian chemist Julius Scaliger (1484–1558), though it was found in large quantities only in 1750 when Spaniards mining for silver in Rio Pinto, Colombia discovered it as an impurity and named it "little silver" (it's also sometimes called "white gold").
