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Gold and golden mean very different things in English, as gold is the material and golden is simply the colour. A golden key would be "una llave dorada." This sentence explicitly states that the key is made of the metal, gold, rather than simply being of golden colour.
Your description is a good way for an English speaker to remember how to read the Spanish, but I think it is not completely true that "golden" only means the color in English, especially for non-literal phrases, e.g. "goose that lays the golden egg" is a metaphor for something that provides a highly valuable service or product, such as an egg made of gold (whereas a gold-colored egg wouldn't be so valuable); similarly "golden parachute" refers to an exit scenario that makes one rich; the "golden rule" is the most valuable rule, as though it were made of gold.
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Not quite, Iago is more correct in this case since the eggs would be golden even were they painted that color, and the golden parachute is a metaphor I do not think corresponds to a real world example and would still be true even were the parachute woven of some material dyed that color. You are right to the extent that things OF gold are golden, but not right that golden denotes 'made of gold', otherwise Charlie wouldn't have needed to go to the factory, he had a golden ticket.
All that glitters is not gold, but all that is golden is of that color.
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You are each correct. Sometimes we just need to resign ourselves to the fact that we all use words slightly differently. http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/golden
I listened to that voice twice and still heard 'coro', instead of 'oro'. Is it just me? Just wondering...
yep.... I'm doing the same. there's no place to explain anything on the report but to me saying it is a gold key is no different than saying it is a red, yellow, green, or blue key -- llave roja/amarilla etc. But a key made out of gold is different. oh well. I'm confident that in the extremely unlikely event that i use this phrase in real life in south america they will know what I mean.
