El Dorado or governor of Guatavita: There is also an account, titled "The Quest of El Dorado", by poet-priest and historian of the Conquest Juan de Castellanos, who had served under Jiménez de Quesada in his campaign against the Muisca, written in the mid-16th century but not published until 1850: According to Spanish historian Gonzalo Fernández de Oviedo (1478–1557): He went about all covered with powdered gold, as casually as if it were powdered salt. For it seemed to him that to wear any other finery was less beautiful, and that to put on ornaments or arms made of gold worked by
El Dorado County, California through El Dorado County until its replacement with the telegraph service in 1861; U.S. Highway 50 follows the Pony Express route today. The "Placerville Mountain Democrat", California's oldest surviving newspaper, serves El Dorado County. The El Dorado County Sheriff provides court protection, county jail administration, and coroner service for all of the county and provides patrol and detective services for the unincorporated areas of the county. Placerville, population 11,000, has a municipal police department, as does South Lake Tahoe, population 22,000. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the county has a total area of , of which is land and