Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A country rich beyond all precedent in gold and jewels, which the early Spanish explorers believed to exist somewhere in the new world, and which Orellana averred that he had found in his voyage down the Amazon in 1540-41.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • A name given by the Spaniards in the 16th century to an imaginary country in the interior of South America, reputed to abound in gold and precious stones.
  • Any region of fabulous wealth; exceeding richness.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • proper noun A Muisca tribal chief who covered himself in gold dust
  • proper noun A legendary lost city of gold
  • proper noun Thus, any place of fabulous wealth

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun an imaginary place of great wealth and opportunity; sought in South America by 16th-century explorers
  • noun an imaginary place of great wealth and opportunity; sought in South America by 16th-century explorers

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Spanish The golden one

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Examples

  • Pacific Rim owns a mine called El Dorado, which is near the community of San Isidro, where Marcelo Rivera lived and was organizing.

    Democracy Now! 2010

  • Pacific Rim owns a mine called El Dorado, which is near the community of San Isidro, where Marcelo Rivera lived and was organizing.

    Democracy Now! 2010

  • Pacific Rim owns a mine called El Dorado, which is near the community of San Isidro, where Marcelo Rivera lived and was organizing.

    Democracy Now! 2010

  • Pacific Rim owns a mine called El Dorado, which is near the community of San Isidro, where Marcelo Rivera lived and was organizing.

    Democracy Now! 2010

  • It was truly one of the greatest adventures of the age, and historic, for here we get the word El Dorado, used for the first time in the history of discovery -- the legendary land of gold which was never found, but which attracted all the Elizabethan sailors to this romantic country.

    A Book of Discovery The History of the World's Exploration, From the Earliest Times to the Finding of the South Pole

  • The name El Dorado, "The Golden," was given to this fabled country; and for a score or more of years after Orellana had told his story, efforts were made to find it.

    Discoverers and Explorers 1879

  • The cacique would be covered from head to toe in powdered gold, thus the name El Dorado, or "the Golden one".

    Medlogs - Recent stories 2010

  • El Dorado police say someone called El Dorado High School about 8am, Monday and made a bomb threat.

    KWCH - KWCH.com RSS 2010

  • The cacique would be covered from head to toe in powdered gold, thus the name El Dorado, or "the Golden one".

    Medlogs - Recent stories 2010

  • And then today in El Dorado, which is 40 miles from here, where the ranch is actually located the adult, the men and women, the judge said if you men and women want your children back, you are going to have to come in to law enforcement in the city of El Dorado and be tested there.

    CNN Transcript Apr 22, 2008 2008

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