plantation
(plænˈteɪʃən)
[ad. L. plantātiōnem planting, transplanting, n. of action f. plantāre to plant; see -ation. Cf. F. plantation (1486).]
1. a. The action of planting, the placing of plants in the soil so that they may grow. Now rare.
| c 1450 Mirour Saluacioun 1065 Aarons ȝerde fructified without plantacioune. 1612 Capt. Smith Map Virginia 16 In Aprill they begin to plant, but their chiefe plantation is in May. 1667 Milton P.L. ix. 419 In Bowre and Field he sought, where any tuft Of Grove or Garden-Plot more pleasant lay, Thir tendance or Plantation for delight. 1724 Swift Drapier's Lett. Wks. 1755 V. ii. 129 The manifest defects in the acts concerning the plantation of trees. 1816 T. Taylor in Pamphleteer VIII. 469 She instructed the Eleusinians in the plantation of corn. |
b. fig. The action of establishing or founding anything,
e.g. a religion; the implanting (
of a quality);
† the laying out (of wealth).
| 1605 Bacon Adv. Learn. i. vi. §13 Those instruments, which it pleased God to use for the plantation of the faith. 1620 E. Blount Horæ Subs. 327 The place where holinesse, and religion, aymed to haue their principall plantation. 1654 tr. Scudery's Curia Pol. 183 Heaven and Nature concur in the plantation of that quality [fortitude] in the hearts of men. 1795 Horsley Serm. (1811) 247 The plantation of churches and the propagation of the gospel. |
c. The settlement of persons in some locality;
esp. the planting of a colony; colonization.
| 1586 J. Hooker Hist. Irel. Ep. Ded., Not for anie religion or plantation of a Commonwealth. 1610 T. Blenerhasset (title) A Direction for the Plantation in Ulster. 1610 (title) A true and sincere Declaration of the Purpose and Ends of the Plantation begun in Virginia. 1625 N. Carpenter Geog. Del. ii. xiii. (1635) 213 The first plantation of Inhabitants immediately after the Deluge. a 1645 Habington Surv. Worc. in Worc. Hist. Soc. Proc. ii. 317 Before theyre plantation in Worcestershire they weare of Rageley. 1672 Petty Pol. Anat. vii, The old protestants of Queen Elizabeth and King James's plantation..did not much love the new English, who came over since 1641. 1788 Priestley Lect. Hist. iii. xvi. 143 Before the discovery of America and the plantation of our colonies, the interest of money was generally twelve per cent. all over Europe. 1870 Athenæum 23 July 110/2 Plantation meant the establishment of Englishmen as landowners in Ireland, the extermination of native proprietors, and the reduction of the inhabitants at large to slavery. |
2. a. An assemblage of growing plants of any kind which have been planted.
| 1569 Reg. Privy Council Scot. II. 32 Destroy and put away..all biggingis, munitionis, plantationis and commoditeis within and about the same. 1649 W. Blithe Eng. Improv. Impr. (1653) 157 So thou must go on throughout thy whole Plantation. 1658 Sir T. Browne Gard. Cyrus i, Which was no ordinary plantation, if..it contained all kindes of Plants. 1741 Compl. Fam.-Piece ii. iii. 404 Make Plantations of the Suckers or Cuttings of Goosberries, Currants, and Rasberries. 1766 Compl. Farmer s.v. Onion, About October all their leaves die away, which has occasioned some to think all the plantation [i.e. onion-bed] lost. 1846 J. Baxter Libr. Pract. Agric. (ed. 4) I. 71 Culture, &c. of the Common Artichoke... I also prefer one single row to a regular plantation or bed, on account of the better admission of light and air. |
b. Now,
esp., a wood of planted trees.
| 1669 Sturmy Mariner's Mag. v. iv. 15 You will have the true Plott of your Ground, or Park, or Wood-land, or Plantation. 1739 Gray Let. Poems (1775) 71 On either hand vast plantations of trees, chiefly mulberries and olives. 1806 Gazetteer Scotl. (ed. 2) s.v. Lhanbryd, A plain..covered with corn, grass, or plantations. 1846 M{supc}Culloch Acc. Brit. Empire (1854) I. 546 During the last half century, many very large additions have been made to the plantations of Scotland... The total woodland must, at this moment..considerably exceed 1,000,000 acres. |
† 3. fig. a. That which has been planted, founded, or settled, as an institution, a mission station.
Obs.| 1570 Foxe A. & M. (ed. 2) 1053/1, I take it [auricular confession] for a plantation, not planted by God in his worde. 1653 E. Chisenhale Cath. Hist. 83 The Apostles amongst themselves were equall, and their severall plantations coordinate and equal. 1704 Nelson Fest. & Fasts vii. (1739) 90 Both [were] sent down by the Apostles to Samaria, to settle the Plantations Philip had made. |
b. An oyster-bed: see
plant v. 1 b.
| 1891 W. K. Brooks Oyster 127 Before the bottom was laid out in private plantations, there were very few persons living there. |
4. a. A settlement in a new or conquered country; a colony. Also
transf. Obs. exc. Hist. (
Cf. 1 c.)
Chiefly those formed in the New World, and on the forfeited lands in Ireland; also, the ancient colonies of Greece, etc.
| 1614 Sylvester Bethulia's Rescue i. 385 (Bees) Else-where to plant their goodly Colonies; Which keep, still constant, in their new Plantation. 1622 Capt. Smith (title) New Englands Trials... With the present estate of that happie Plantation, begun by but 60 weake men in the yeare 1620. 1635 E. Pagitt Christianogr. i. ii. (1636) 86 In America, there be diverse Plantations of the English, Dutch, and French. a 1656 Ussher Ann. vi. (1658) 169 Heraclea, a plantation of the city of Megara. a 1687 Petty Pol. Arith. Pref., Ireland and the Plantations in America..are a Burthen to England. 1769 Junius Lett. i. (1820) 6 A new office is established for the business of the plantations. 1800 Colquhoun Comm. Thames xi. 328 All goods of the produce of Ireland, and the British Plantations. 1865 Merivale Rom. Emp. VIII. lxiii. 42 Roman plantations, and possibly military stations also reached even to the Dniester. |
† b. A company of settlers or colonists.
Obs.| 1647 Stapylton Juvenal 231 Ascanius..carrying forth a plantation of men,..found a white sow with 30 pigges sucking her. 1651 Hobbes Leviath. ii. xxiv. (1839) 239 Those we call plantations, or colonies..are numbers of men sent out from the commonwealth, under a conductor, or governor, to inhabit a foreign country, either formerly void of inhabitants, or made void then by war. a 1715 Burnet Own Time (1823) II. 321 (an. 1682) This revived among them [the gentry] a design..of carrying over a plantation to Carolina. |
c. to send (prisoners, etc.) to the plantations,
i.e. to penal service or indentured labour in the colonies, ‘a method of treating criminals of all kinds much in favour during the 17th century’ (C. H. Firth in
Eng. Hist. Rev., 1889, 335).
As the labour was chiefly on the plantations in sense 5, the phrase tended to be associated with that sense.
| 1650 Acts Parl. Scot. (Recd. ed.) VI. ii. 745 b, To deliver unto M{supr} Samuel Clarke, to transport to Virginia, 900 prisoners of the Scots [taken at Dunbar]..according to such desires as shall bee made by anie who will carrie them to plantations not in enmity to this Commonwealth. 1655 Mercurius Politicus 24–31 May, Divers persons..who were in the late rebellious insurrection, were to be sent away to the foreign plantations. c 1664 in Burnet Own Time ii. (1724) I. 209 If his Majesty had any such intention, he would rather choose to be sent to a plantation. 1760 Burke Corr. (1844) I. 73 Will the law suffer a felon sent to the plantations, to bind himself for life? 1849 Macaulay Hist. Eng. v. I. 660 Some of them had been hanged:..and the rest should be sent to the plantations. |
5. An estate or farm,
esp. in a tropical or subtropical country, on which cotton, tobacco, sugar-cane, coffee, or other crops are cultivated, formerly chiefly by servile labour: see
planter 4.
| 1706 Phillips, Plantation, a Spot of Ground in America for the planting of Tobacco, Sugar-canes, &c. 1719 De Foe Crusoe (1840) I. xi. 180, I had..two plantations in the island. 1818 Cruise Digest (ed. 2) VI. 85 A person..devised to trustees..a plantation in the island of Grenada, upon trust. 1837 H. Martineau Soc. Amer. II. 143 They were seized upon by two slaves of the neighbouring plantation. 1898 Besant Orange Girl ii. xxv, In Virginia every estate is a plantation..with its servants and slaves. |
† 6. That on which any structure is planted; a base, a foundation, a platform.
Obs. rare.
| a 1680 Butler Rem. (1759) I. 352 You had better undertake to find out a Plantation for Archimedes his Engines to move the Earth. 1688 Capt. J. S. Fortification 69 Platforms..are the Plantations where the Guns are laid. |
7. attrib. and
Comb., as (in senses 1, 2)
plantation-hoe,
plantation-making;
plantation-like adj.; (sense 4)
plantation-aloe,
† plantation-cause,
† plantation clerk,
† plantation-land,
plantation-sugar;
plantation-built adj.; (sense 5)
plantation-coolie,
plantation-dance,
plantation-house,
plantation manners,
plantation-mansion,
plantation-Negro,
plantation-slave,
plantation style,
plantation-worker;
† plantation-acre, an acre in plantation-measure;
= the Irish acre;
plantation creole, a creolized language arising amongst a transplanted and largely isolated Negroid community;
plantation crepe U.S., used
attrib. of a variety of crêpe-rubber sole on footwear;
† plantation-measure, the variety of land-measure formerly used in the plantations of Ireland, in which the acre contained 7840 sq. yards;
plantation-mill, a mill suitable for use on a plantation, for crushing oats, etc.;
† Plantation Office, early name of the Colonial Office;
plantation song, a song of the kind sung by Negroes on the American plantations.
| 1771–2 Irish Act 11 & 12 Geo. III, c. 21 §5 Any bog of less dimensions than ten *plantation acres. |
| 1766 Compl. Farmer s.v. Purging, The Succotrine aloes should always be preferred to the Barbadoes, or *plantation aloes. |
| 1709 Lond. Gaz. No. 4541/3 The Ship Rolland.., *Plantation-built. c 1744 in Hanway Trav. (1753) II. i. xii. 68 Any other British or plantation-built ship. |
| a 1715 Burnet Own Time iii. (1724) I. 298 There was..a *Plantation-cause at the Council board. |
| 1684 E. Chamberlayne Pres. St. England ii. (ed. 15) 241 Ricard Savage, *Plantation Clerk. |
| 1938 Social Forces Oct. 114/2 The *plantation creole tongues are true Sklavensprachen. Although they owe something to the sailors' trade jargons, they began essentially as a makeshift means of communication between masters and field hands. 1978 Verbatim Feb. 10/1 Both authors hold to..the Creolist theory, which traces the present-day Black English vernacular to a Plantation Creole, to a plantation-maritime pidgin, to an African origin. |
| 1967 New Yorker 7 Oct. 109/2 (Advt.), Clark's original Desert ® Boots..with *plantation crepe soles. 1969 Sears, Roebuck & Co. Catal. Spring-Summer 454/2 Durable, buoyant, plantation crepe rubber sole and heel. 1969 E. Wilson Hist. Shoe Fashions xx. 258 A plantation crepe sole was one of the many soft soles which added to its comfort. |
| a 1860 Alb. Smith Lond. Med. Stud. (1861) 10 He was about to practise his *plantation-dance up-stairs, and..the ceiling might come down. |
| 1766 Compl. Farmer s.v. Lucern, Before that time the flat *plantation-hoe may be used. |
| 1722 De Foe Col. Jack (1840) 283, I came to the *plantation-house. 1831 J. M. Peck Guide for Emigrants ii. 55 All the plantation houses are surrounded with rich and beautiful groves. 1973 Advocate-News (Barbados) 2 Feb. 15/4 (Advt.), Besides the plantation house there is available the plantation manager's house. 1974 Country Life 3–10 Jan. 18/1 The Virginian plantation houses of the 18th century, such as Carter's Grove, Westover and Shirley. |
| 1639 Irish Act 15 Chas. I, sess. ii. c. 6 §2 Towns, villages, hamlets, lands,..usually called *plantation lands, in or neere the territories of Cloncolman. |
| 1897 M. Kingsley W. Africa 642 He did his utmost to try and get the natives to embark on *plantation-making, ably seconded by Mr. Billington, the botanist. |
| 1854 Thoreau Walden 165 Men of almost every degree of wit called on me in the migrating season. Some who had more wits than they knew what to do with; runaway slaves with *plantation manners, who listened from time to time, like the fox in the fable, as if they heard the hounds a-baying on their track. 1897 Congress. Rec. 31 Mar. 548/2 When I was a boy,..I used to read a great deal about what the early Republicans called ‘plantation manners’. |
| 1642 Act 18 Chas. I, c. 36 (Ireland) *Plantation measure,..every Acre thereof shall consist of eightscore Pearches or Poles..of one and twenty foot. 1771–2 Irish Act 11 & 12 Geo. III, c. 21 §2 No greater quantity of such bog shall be so set to any one person than fifty acres, plantation measure. |
| 1771 in Maryland Hist. Mag. (1919) XIV. 135 My people..do not live so well as our House negroes, But full as well as any *Plantation negroes. 1866 A. Flint Princ. Med. (1880) 511 Among the plantation negroes of the Southern States. 1956 G. P. Kurath in A. Dundes Mother Wit (1973) 108/1 Recreational dances of plantation Negroes commenced with a prayer. |
| 1753 De Foe's Tour Gt. Brit. (ed. 5) II. 104 Where formerly was kept the Office of the Secretary of State for Scotland, now abolished, is the *Plantation-office. |
| 1871 Schele de Vere Americanisms 116 The Negro-minstrel is the artist who blackens his face, adopts the black man's manner and instrument, and recites his field and *plantation songs. 1896 M. W. Hungerford Lonely Girl xiii. 127 Singing plantation songs to the..banjo. |
| 1957 P. Worsley Trumpet shall Sound viii. 148 *Plantation-workers were convinced by Runovoro's ability to write meaningless works. 1976 Honolulu Star-Bull. 21 Dec. a–8/2 Approximately 175 Molokai Dole plantation workers..lost their jobs last year because of foreign competition. |
Hence
planˈtationer, one who took part in the plantation of Ulster;
† planˈtationite, a colonist.
| 1756 Monitor No. 71 II. 184 Hear ye men of Britannia! give ear ye..Plantationites! and such as dwell on the continent of America. 1888 J. Harrison Scot in Ulster iv. 56 The ‘plantationers’ came accompanied by clergymen. |