Plant
One-Name Study

Topics

• Variants
• Origin of the surname
• Frequency of the name
• Distribution of the name
• DNA project
• Links
• Contact Details

Variants

Planta, de la Planta, von Planta, Plante, Plantt, Plant (from early forms Plaunt, Plonte, Plante and Plantt), and possibly Plenty (from early form Plente or Plonte) and Pallant (from Palente).

Also interested in `similar' names, such as Plantagenet, Planterose, Plantyn and Plantard.

Origin of the surname

See note on the name's meaning and further discussion of its orgins.

Frequency of the name

The name and its variants are widely spread throughout the world, particularly in former English colonies. There are, for example, around 12,000 Plants in the UK and 2,000 with the spellings Plante, Planty and Plantie in SW France.

Distribution of the name

See distribution.

DNA project

See full details or a brief outline of how to join and receive further advice.

Links

Plant Family History Group web site:

• entry page.

Some recent academic papers on:

• Plant;
• Plantagenet; and,
• polygyny

all contain references to the Plant surname and indicate that the reasoning behind the commonly supposed meaning 'gardener' is flawed and that a more likely meaning for the surviving surname of the main English Plant family is 'offspring'.

That is not to say that the were not earlier by-names with different meanings. A comprehensive view is that the first form of the name was `de la Planta' meaning from an Alpine region called La Planta. The surviving names Von Planta and Planta, near the Engadine, could mean `from the garden source of the River Inn'. In 1350, the London priest Henry Plante was from Risole, evidently Risoul in the French Alps. However, it seems that the meaning morphed, or arose independently, for a gardener near Hull and to mean `children' (Welsh) or `offspring' (archaic English) in the main Plant homeland near Wales.

See also contacts for links to other officers of the Plant Family History Society.

Contact details

For further information, contact:

Dr John S Plant
7 Ontario Close,
Trentham,
Stoke-on-Trent,
Staffordshire
ST4 8TG
UNITED KINGDOM
E-mail:

This page last updated 13 January 2012.

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Profiles of other one-name studies registered with the Guild may be found here.