Gold facts

 Well lets assume that is true, how big is the room? We have 10 feet deep. If the treasure is say 50% gold (I assume the dragon likes to see his gold so he puts that on top, the lower 5 feet proably is copper, silver and basic treasures - the feathers of the dragons bed) how much more is the size of the room? Well lets make it 9' average height (the same as the treasure room in real life) there is a least one 22 foot by 17 foot section in that room so at least 1/2 the great horde (so about 6,000 pounds of gold, or 60,000 gp, and 6,000 pounds of other coins mostly copper mixed in) - so how many more or less 20 by 20 sections (a little less 20 by 19 ish but let us keep it simple) It looks like a big room say 40 by a 100? So about 10 20 by 20 sections for a total of 10 times the horde size in real life, 1/2 in gold, so 5 times the gold value or 300,000 gp (or 6 high end magic swords in value) 15 tonnes of gold.
         Or 1/10 of the total plunder of all the gold the Spanish took. A HUGE horde for sure.  The US mines about 120 tonnes a year currently of gold. So a bit more than 10% of 1 year gold production.

Assuming the dragon was 1,400 year old, and we ignore the first 400 years (the none ancient dragon years) that is 0.015 tonnes a year of gold collected. Lets lower his age and make that rate at 4 times , so 0.06 tonnes  year (for a dragon about 650 years old or 120 pounds  a year or 1,200 gp collected a year (over 250 years no treasure till ancient) I could see that just from tribue alone - it is the same as have 400 peasants paying 5 sp a month in tax. It is just ONE small lords tax base in tribute. In this case the towns folk actually probably will be worse off after the dragon dies -as then they will have to play taxes for an army (where before the dragon chases everyone away.)

     Of course that assuming 9 feet deep of treasure, with a room 40 by a 100. Make it 8o by 200 and the horde would be 4 times bigger - or 4 lords tax base for 250 years. As aside king Tuts Tomb was rated at $650 million in 2004.

http://www.numbersleuth.org/worlds-gold/


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