Dictionary

lodestar en · NOUN

Pronunciation

• (US) audio
• /ˈloʊd.stɑɹ/ (General-American)
• /ˈləʉd.staː(ɹ)/ (Australia)
• /ˈləʊd.stɑː(ɹ)/ (Received-Pronunciation)

Etymology

From Middle English lode (“journey, course”) + star, where lode is an archaic noun from the verb lithe (“to go, journey”), related to lead. Other Middle English spellings include: 14th century loode sterre, lood-sterre, lade-sterne; and 15th century lode sterre. Cognate with Old Norse leiðarstjarna, Dutch leidster, German Leitstern, Danish ledestjerne, Swedish ledstjärna.

Meanings

1. A star used as a navigation reference, particularly a pole star such as Polaris.
   • He was no wavering mariner; he had taken his course from a single lodestar, by which he had steered from the first day he had seen it in his heavens — the lodestar that had shone for him and would always shine. 1905, Sidney Robinson Kennedy, The Lodestar, page 332:
   • Tho when her ways he could no more descry, But to and fro at disaventure strayd; Like as a ship, whose lodestarre, suddenly Covered with cloudes, her pilot hath dismayd 1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book III, Canto IV”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC:
2. (figuratively) A guiding tenet or principle.
   • With export controls still restricting the sale of the most advanced chips to China and its university students increasingly unwelcome in the U.S., technological self-sufficiency has become Beijing’s lodestar. 2025 December 11, Charlie Campbell, Andrew R. Chow and Billy Perrigo, “The Architects of AI Are TIME’s 2025 Person of the Year”, in Time:
   • Selfe loue, to him ſelf tender, to the reſt tough, / Is, of iuſt iuſtice, neither roote, braunce, nor bough. / Loue (namely ſelfe loue) corruptibly growyng, / Is cheefe lodeſter of lets, in iuſtice ſhowing. 1556, John Heywood, chapter 7, in The Spider and the Flie. […], London: […] Tho[mas] Powell, →OCLC; republished as A[dolphus] W[illiam] Ward, editor, The Spider and the Flie. […] (Publications of the Spenser Society, New Series; 6), Manchester: […] [Charles E. Simms] for the Spenser Society, 1894, →OCLC, page 50:
   • May we not define its true aim to be that of awakening in the heart those feelings towards moral and religious objects, which like attractions drawing towards the great lodestars of existence, shall ever keep the life right and stedfast? 1851, Mary Carpenter, “Reformatory Schools”, in The Prospective Review, volume 7, page 355:
   • We need a new lodestar, a new map of the world that once again includes a distant, uncharted continent—“Utopia.” 2017, Rutger Bregman, chapter 1, in Elizabeth Manton, transl., Utopia for Realists, Kindle edition, Bloomsbury Publishing:
3. A calculated amount to award as attorney's fees derived by multiplying the reasonable number of hours spent working on a case by the reasonable hourly billing rate.
   • Many, though not all, of the objections to lodestars seem to us to be overstated. 1992, Richard L. Marcus, Complex litigation: cases and materials on advanced civil procedure:

Forms

Relateds

lodestone

Synonyms

guiding star · cynosure

Translations (34)

da ledestjerne (guiding tenet) · pt estrela guia (guiding tenet) · no ledestjerne (guiding tenet) · ja 北極星 (star used as navigation reference) · nl poolster (star used as navigation reference) · fa ستاره قطبی (star used as navigation reference) · cmn 北極星 /北极星 (star used as navigation reference) · sv ledstjärna (guiding tenet) · nl leidster (guiding tenet) · no ledestjerne (star used as navigation reference) · bg пътеводна звезда (star used as navigation reference) · cmn 北辰 (star used as navigation reference) · cmn 指示方向之星 (star used as navigation reference) · de Leitstern (guiding tenet) · da ledestjerne (star used as navigation reference) · sh zv(ij)ezda vodilja (star used as navigation reference) · ja 指導原理 (guiding tenet) · pl gwiazda przewodnia (guiding tenet) · de Leitstern (star used as navigation reference) · ja ポラリス (star used as navigation reference) · sh zv(ij)ezda vodilja (guiding tenet) · sv ledstjärna (star used as navigation reference) · nl leidster (star used as navigation reference) · fr étoile polaire (star used as navigation reference) · fi johtotähti (star used as navigation reference) · ru путево́дная звезда́ (guiding tenet) · vi sao bắc cực (star used as navigation reference) · ro stea călăuzitoare (guiding tenet) · ru путево́дная звезда́ (star used as navigation reference) · pl gwiazda polarna (star used as navigation reference) · pl gwiazda przewodnia (star used as navigation reference) · fi johtotähti (guiding tenet) · cmn 指導原理 /指导原理 (guiding tenet) · vi 𣋀北極 (star used as navigation reference)