transplantation

Etymology

It is formed from English transplant + -ation, and the OED compares plantation.^[2][3][4] Etymonline takes it from French transplantation, a noun of action from transplanter,^[5] which the OED records in French from the 16th century.^[2] The verb transplant goes back to Middle English transplaunten,^[4] from Late Latin transplantō (“to plant again in another place”),^[5][4] from trāns- (“across”) and plantō (“to plant”).^[5][2]

Earliest recorded meaning

The moving of a plant from one place or soil to another: 1601, in Philemon Holland's translation of Pliny.^[2] Etymonline dates the noun to about 1600, with the senses of moving a plant and of moving people to another place.^[5] In the plant sense Middle English had used transplanting.^[5]

Semantic evolution

Already in 1606 the word was used of moving people from one place to another, especially of removing a people from their country and settling them in another,^[2] and by 1641 it could name a transplanted group itself.^[2] From 1655 it was the name of a supposed cure that passed a disease from a patient to another person, an animal or a plant,^[2][3][4] a practice now only of historical interest.^[2][3] Johnson (1755) defined it as moving to another soil, and also as removal or migration.^[6] The surgical sense, the transfer of an organ or tissue from one part of the body or from one body to another, is recorded from 1813,^[2][5] and it is now the usual meaning.^[4][3]

Timeline

• 1601 – the moving of a plant to new soil.^[2] Etymonline dates it to about 1600.^[5]
• 1606 – removal of people from one country and their settlement in another.^[2]
• before 1641 – a transplanted group of people.^[2]
• 1655 – the supposed cure of a disease by passing it to another person, an animal or a plant.^[2]
• 1813 – in surgery, the transfer of an organ or of tissue.^[2][5]

Meanings

Noun

1. The act or process of transplanting, or the state of being transplanted.^[4][3]
2. The surgical removal of an organ or tissue from one part of the body, or from one person or animal, and its placing in another: She was put on the waiting list for kidney transplantation.^[4][2]
3. The moving of a plant from one place or soil to another.^[2][6]
4. The removal of people from their country or home and their settlement in another place.^[2][6]
5. (obsolete) A supposed magical cure that made a disease pass from the sick person to another person, an animal or a plant.^[2][4][3]

Word family

• retransplantation
• xenotransplantation

Related words

• transplant
• plant
• plantation
• implantation

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
4. ^ a b c d e f g h Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
5. ^ a b c d e f g h Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
6. ^ a b c Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.