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What (who) is white elephant - definition
White elephant
![A white elephant at the [[Amarapura]] Palace in 1855](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:FilePath/Lord White Elephant.jpg?width=200 "A white elephant at the [[Amarapura]] Palace in 1855")
![British East Africa Company]] came to regard Uganda as a white elephant when internal conflict made administration of the territory impossible.](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:FilePath/The White Elephant, Punch 103.png?width=200 "British East Africa Company]] came to regard Uganda as a white elephant when internal conflict made administration of the territory impossible.")
IDIOM – NAME FOR LARGE CONSTRUCTIONS THAT ARE NOT USED
White Elephant; White elephants
A white elephant is a possession that its owner cannot dispose of, and whose cost, particularly that of maintenance, is out of proportion to its usefulness. In modern usage, it is a metaphor used to describe an object, construction project, scheme, business venture, facility, etc.
white elephant
IDIOM – NAME FOR LARGE CONSTRUCTIONS THAT ARE NOT USED
White Elephant; White elephants
¦ noun a possession that is useless or troublesome, especially one that is expensive to maintain or difficult to dispose of.
Origin
from the story that the kings of Siam gave such animals as a gift to courtiers they disliked, in order to ruin the recipient by the great expense incurred in maintaining the animal.
white elephant
IDIOM – NAME FOR LARGE CONSTRUCTIONS THAT ARE NOT USED
White Elephant; White elephants
(white elephants)
If you describe something as a white elephant, you mean that it is a waste of money because it is completely useless.
The pavilion has become a ?14 million steel and glass white elephant.
N-COUNT [disapproval]
Examples of use of white elephant
1. "The phrase ‘white elephant‘ springs to mind," Boettcher said.
2. I didn‘t want to do it÷ it‘s such a white elephant of a topic.
3. But will what emerges turn out to be an exceptionally costly white elephant?
4. But the white elephant raises shrugs in Mantecal wherever it is mentioned.
5. Canfranc is perhaps the most spectacular, most ignored and most bizarre white elephant in Europe.