lode

[lohd]

SEE MORE SYNONYMS FOR lode ON THESAURUS.COM

noun

a veinlike deposit, usually metalliferous.

any body of ore set off from adjacent rock formations.

a rich supply or source.

British. a waterway or channel.

RELATED WORDS

vein, strike, mine, reef, fissure, lead

Nearby words

Origin of lode

before 900; Middle English; Old English lād way, course, carrying; cognate with Old Norse leith way, route, Old High German leita procession. See load, lade, lead¹

Can be confusedload lode

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2019

Examples from the Web for lode

O'Hara has faded fast, but some of his best short stories are lode stars to me of what good fiction can do.
My Conversation with John Updike|Barbara Probst Solomon|January 29, 2009|DAILY BEAST
I give you my word, Slade, this is the only mine or lode of which I know.
Bloom of Cactus|Robert Ames Bennet
Your lode's about a hundred miles off yet, isn't it, Graham?
For the Allinson Honor|Harold Bindloss
Mebbe he believes that bunk about the lode being copper, and mebbe he don't.
Bloom of Cactus|Robert Ames Bennet

It took me half of the next day to locate the lode, and while I was pilin' the monuments I looked up and saw that villain, Jacks.
Motor Matt's Daring, or, True to His Friends|Stanley R. Matthews
There are no true walls nor can the ore be traced away from the hill in lode form.
Getting Gold|J. C. F. Johnson

British Dictionary definitions for lode

lode

noun

a deposit of valuable ore occurring between definite limits in the surrounding rock; vein

a deposit of metallic ore filling a fissure in the surrounding rock

Word Origin for lode

Old English lād course. Compare load

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Word Origin and History for lode

lode

original Middle English spelling of load (n.), and custodian of most of the original meaning of "way, course, carrying." Differentiation in sense took place 16c. Mining sense of "vein of metal ore" is from c.1600, from notion of miners "following" it through the rock.

Science definitions for lode

lode

[lōd]

A vein of mineral ore that is deposited between clearly demarcated layers of rock or that fills a fissure in a rock formation.