[ad. late L. transformātiōn-em (Jerome, a. 400), n. of action from transformāre to TRANSFORM. Cf. F. transformation (14th c. in Hatz.-Darm.).] The action of transforming or fact of being transformed.
1. The action of changing in form, shape, or appearance; metamorphosis.
1432–50. trans. Higden (Rolls), II. 209. Monstruous transformaciones of men in to bestes be made … thro charmes of wicches.
1548. Udall, Erasm. Par. Mark i. 5 b. Transformacions and naturall chaungynges of thynges.
1555. Eden, Decades, 43, margin. Fables much lyke Ouide his transformations.
1596. Shaks., 1 Hen. IV., I. i. 44. Vpon whose dead corpes there was such misuse, Such beastly, shamelesse transformation.
1794. Sullivan, View Nat., I. 112. Matter is capable of many seeming transformations, but no real transmutations have ever been discovered.
1864. Bryce, Holy Rom. Emp., xv. 260. No more than a man feels that perpetual transformation by which his body is renewed from year to year.
† b. A changed form; a person or thing transformed. Obs. rare.
1598. Shaks., Merry W., IV. v. 98. If it should come to the care of the Court, how I haue beene transformed; and how my transformation hath beene washd, and cudgeld.
c. Theatr. More fully transformation scene: A mechanical disclosing scene in a pantomime; spec. the scene in which the principal performers were transformed in view of the audience into the players of the ensuing harlequinade.
1859. Punch, 5 Feb., 58/2. I have supped full of gorgeous transformations on which paint, coloured foils, Dutch metal … have been lavished.
1881. Playgoer, 1 Jan. A magnificent Transformation, a charming Watteau ballet scene.
1881. G. A. Sala, in Illustr. Lond. News, 1 Jan., 3/2. Two Grand Transformation Scenes.
1885. W. J. Lawrence, in The Theatre, Dec., 329. The account of the sixth scene is worthy of quotation, smacking as it does of the modern ‘Transformation.’ Ibid. (1885), in Lett. During the Grimaldi era the term ‘transformation scene’ referred to that particular juncture of the performance at which the good fairy changed the hero and heroine and their two persecutors in full view of the audience into Harlequin, Columbine, Clown and Pantaloon respectively.
2. transf. A complete change in character, condition, etc.
1581. Pettie, Guazzo’s Civ. Conv., II. (1586), 81. The simple soules not perceiuing that this their transformation or rather deformation, is no more seene than a pose in a mans face.
1602. Shaks., Ham., II. ii. 5. Something haue you heard Of Hamlets transformation: so I call it, Since not th’ exterior, nor the inward man Resembles that it was.
1746–7. Hervey, Medit. (1818), 59. To behold the prodigious transformation which has taken place on every individual.
1833. Alison, Hist. Europe, I. i. § 60. 104. The transformation of France … from a feudal Confederacy … to a compact and absolute monarchy.
1900. R. J. Drummond, Apost. Teach. & Christ’s Teach., ix. 347. A regenerative transformation of humanity is practicable.
3. In scientific uses. a. Zool. Change of form in animal life, as in the successive transformations of insects, etc.; metamorphosis.
1638. Mayne, Lucian (1664), 45. A Polypus I have seen, but would gladly learn its transformation from you.
1667. E. King, in Phil. Trans., II. 427. The black Speck … cast out of the Maggot in her transformation.
1774. Goldsm., Nat. Hist. (1776), VIII. 7. Of the Transformations of the Caterpillar into its corresponding Butterfly or Moth.
1874. Lubbock, Orig. & Met. Ins., i. 4. Linnæus classed them among the Coleoptera, from which however they differ in their transformations.
b. Physiol. and Path. Change of form or substance in an organ, tissue, vital fluid, etc.
1834. J. Forbes, Laennec’s Dis. Chest (ed. 4), 587. Interstitial deposition, which … constitutes what is commonly termed transformation of the organ into a cancerous substance.
1843. J. A. Smith, Product. Farming (ed. 2), 75. The excrementitious matters of one organ come in contact with another during their passage through the plant or animal, and, in consequence, suffer new transformations.
1860. Mayne, Expos. Lex., Transformation, term for a morbid change in a part, consisting in the conversion of its texture into one of a different kind, as of the soft parts into bone or cartilage.
c. Math. Change of form without alteration of quantity or value; substitution of one geometrical figure for another of equal magnitude but different form, as of a prism for a cylinder, or of one algebraical expression or equation for another of the same value; † formerly, also, alteration of the form of a solid figure by truncation of the solid angles: cf. TRANSFIGURED, TRANSFORMED.
Transformation of co-ordinates, an inaccurate but accepted expression for the substitution of a new set of co-ordinates, involving a transformation of the equation of the locus. Hence, in the case in which the new co-ordinates are measured in a different plane or space, transformation is extended to the relation of correspondence between the original and resulting loci, as in projection.
1571. Digges, Pantom., Epist. *ij b. A Discourse Geometricall of the fiue regulare or Platonicall bodyes [with] the manifolde proportions arising by mutuall conference of these solides Inscription, Circumscription or Transformation.
1706. Phillips (ed. Kersey), Transformation of an Equation, (in Algebra) the changing of any Equation into one that is more easy.
1882. Minchin, Unipl. Kinemat., 234. It will be convenient to speak of this quantity K as a modulus of transformation.
1885. Watson & Burbury, Math. Th. Electr. & Magn., I. 157. The method of transformation used with conjugate functions.
d. Physics. Change of form of a substance from solid to liquid, from liquid or solid to gaseous, or the reverse; Chem. change of chemical composition, as by replacement of one constituent of a compound by another.
1857. Miller, Elem. Chem. (1862), III. 67. In order to effect these transformations it is necessary to displace the hydrogen of the acid.
e. Change of energy from one form into another.
1877. W. Garnett, in Encycl. Brit., VII. 583/2. The subject of which natural philosophy treats is the transformation of energy, which in all its phases takes place in accordance with two great principles known respectively as the principles of the conservation and the dissipation of energy. Ibid. (1878), Ibid., VIII. 207/2. If subsequently we allow an equal amount of energy to undergo various intermediate transformations, but to be finally reduced to heat. Ibid. (1902), XXIX. 158. In succeeding years [from 1840] he [Joule] published a series of valuable researches on the agency of electricity in transformations of energy.
f. Electr. Change of a current into one of different potential, or different type, or both, as by a transformer (TRANSFORMER 2). Also attrib.
1884. Electrical Rev., 26 July, 64. Conditions for arranging a transformation coil, as regards its yield.
1911. Encycl. Brit., XXVII. 173/1. Transformers may be distinguished … in accordance with the type of transformation they effect.
4. An artificial head of hair worn by women.
1901. Daily News, 12 Jan., 6/7. Buying toupées, or even ‘transformations,’ as those wigs are called which entirely cover the natural hair.
1903. Westm. Gaz., 6 Aug., 3/2. Hair-dressers are known to make most of their returns by the producing of these transformations.
1906. Referee, . Dec., 11/4. When he got to the exit door he discovered to his horror that he had dragged off the lady’s ‘transformation,’ and it was hanging to his sleeve-link.
5. attrib. and Comb.: transformation-dancer (Theatr.), one who dances successively in several costumes and characters; transformation-jewel, a jewel that may be worn in several ways; transformation product, Chem. a new compound formed by the decomposition or destructive distillation of a complex compound often existing in nature; transformation scene: see 1 c.
1892. Daily News, 29 Jan., 7/2. She was engaged generally upon the music hall stage…. Her peculiar branch was transformation dancing…. She was well known as a transformation dancer.
1892. Pall Mall G., 17 March, 1/3. French jewellers are devoting all their inventive genius to new designs for the setting of these transformation jewels.
Hence Transformational a., of or pertaining to transformation; Transformationist = TRANSFORMIST 1, 2.
1853. The Era, 10 July, 1/3. Unequalled success of the Royal Cremorne Circus, open every evening at a Quarter before Nine, with the most talented troupe of male and female artistes in Europe, including … M. Andre, the Transformationist, from the Hippodrome, Paris.
1881. Cecil Whig (MD), 8 Oct., 1/5. Through observational science we may discover a soil more or less fertile all the world over; but transformational science must show us how to fence and till it, how to drain, or irrigate, or manure it, before it can be made a fruitful field.
1883. Max Müller. Nat. Relig., vi. (1889), 143. We ought to be transformationists and no longer evolutionists.
1894. Athenæum, 10 Nov., 646/2. The distinction between ‘combinational’ and ‘transformational’ theories of experience.
