lode
20
9.1
- noun
- /loʊd/
- Specialized
:
filón
- Twenty feet beyond was the rhodochrosite lode he was mining.
- a rich lode
- the Mother Lode
Examples
-
This lode contains a significant amount of gold and has attracted many prospectors.
-
Some of the largest law firms in the United States continue to mine that lode.
Academic text (2003) -
And apparently, in doing so, we hit a mother lode of natural gas.
-
A mother lode of rare coins, totally uncirculated, like they just came out of the mint.
-
Similarly, of course, miners refer to a rich vein of ore as the mother lode.
Academic text (2016) -
The miners discovered a rich lode of silver deep underground in the mountain.
-
Geologists believe that a large lode of copper runs beneath this area.
Synonyms
16
6.3
A thin layer of metal or rock that runs through the ground
12
6.3
A layer of coal or ore in the earth that can be mined
12
6.8
A large rich source of valuable things like gold or information
6
9.5
A part of rock that contains valuable ore like gold
The main rich vein of rock that has metal in a mine
A thin layer of rock that contains metal or other valuable rock that people can mine
A long thin layer of mineral that fills a crack in rock and often has gold or other metals
Compounds
How Rich
- Informal
12
6.8
- Specialized
12
6.3
- Specialized
20
9.1
- Specialized
16
6.3
492
3.3
Surface Forms
Etymology
The word lode comes from an old English word lād meaning 'way' or 'course', as in lodestar, a star that shows the way. So a mineral lode is like a 'path' or vein of ore running through the earth that carries valuable metal.