Meaning
A possession that costs far more to keep than it is worth and that the owner cannot easily dispose of. It now also extends to grand projects or buildings that become ruinous financial liabilities. Informal to neutral; chiefly used about property, projects, and institutions rather than people. Regional use: General English.
Origin
In parts of Southeast Asia, albino elephants were sacred, spared from work, and expensive to maintain; European accounts of this veneration date from at least the early 17th century. A popular story holds that the kings of Siam gifted white elephants to courtiers they wished to ruin, since the animal could not be worked, sold, or given away; this tale is widely repeated but rests on thin direct evidence and should be treated as an unverified tradition. The earliest English use of the figurative sense recorded by The Phrase Finder appears in G. E. Jewbury's Letters (published 1892, in a letter dated 1851), describing services 'like so many white elephants'. The phrase spread after P. T. Barnum's costly publicity stunt importing the 'Sacred White Elephant of Burma' in the 1880s, and 'white elephant sales' followed in the early 20th century.
Research Sources
References used to check this entry’s meaning, history, or documented forms.
Variants
- gift of a white elephant
- white elephant project
- white elephant sale
- white elephants
Usage Examples
- The stadium became a white elephant once the team relocated and maintenance costs soared.
- Her inherited yacht turned out to be a white elephant, moored and insured but never sailed.
- Every few years the council proposes converting the white elephant of a power station into galleries.