The synthesis of monolayer gold has so far been limited to free-standingseveral-atoms-thick layers, or monolayers confned on or inside templates.Here we report the exfoliation of single-atom-thick gold achieved throughwet-chemically etching away Ti3C2 from nanolaminated Ti3AuC2, initiallyformed by substituting Si in Ti3SiC2 with Au. Ti3SiC2 is a renown MAX phase,where M is a transition metal, A is a group A element, and X is C or N. Ourdeveloped synthetic route is by a facile, scalable and hydrofuoric acid-freemethod. The two-dimensional layers are termed goldene. Goldene layerswith roughly 9% lattice contraction compared to bulk gold are observedby electron microscopy. While ab initio molecular dynamics simulationsshow that two-dimensional goldene is inherently stable, experiments showsome curling and agglomeration, which can be mitigated by surfactants.X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy reveals an Au 4f binding energy increaseof 0.88 eV. Prospects for preparing goldene from other non-van der WaalsAu-intercalated phases, including developing etching schemes,are presented.