planter

1. 1. One who plants.
   2. A machine or tool for planting seeds.
2. The owner or manager of a plantation: cotton and rice planters.
3. An early settler or colonist.
4. A decorative container for a plant or small tree.

In its earliest sense, planter meant a person who helped "plant" or found a colony, often called a plantation. Thus, the founders of Plymouth Plantation called themselves "adventurers and planters" in a document drawn up on the eve of their departure for New England in 1620.

But by then the modern meaning of planter had already begun to develop in Virginia. Ten years of precarious existence seem to have taught the English adventurers there one lesson: The way to get rich was tobacco. It was the one export crop that earned big money, and those who were planters of this crop began to become a wealthy elite. In 1619 the Virginia House of Burgesses used planters in this sense: "Provided first that the Cape Marchant do accept of the Tobacco of all and everie the Planters here in Virginia."

As they sold more tobacco and bought more land, these planters needed more laborers, so they imported African slaves in ever-increasing numbers. Planter thus became the name for an owner of a large estate worked by slave labor. At first it referred to tobacco growers in Virginia and Maryland, but by the end of the seventeenth century it was applied to owners of Plantations (1645) in general, regardless of the crop, and anywhere in the South--in fact anywhere in the tropical and sub-tropical English-speaking world.

There was another more modest early meaning for planter: any individual farmer, regardless of size or type of holdings. An article in the South Carolina Gazette of 1732 refers to "the poorer sort of Planters." But they were overshadowed, in terminology as well as trade, by wealthy owners.

In the nineteenth century, as human labor began to be replaced by mechanical, planter was the name given to a device for planting seeds.

Although labor-intensive plantations of the old sort are long gone, people still evoke the fortunate lifestyle of the plantation owner when they make planter's punch, a rum-based cocktail that is a twentieth-century invention.

A permanent, ornamental container to receive planted pots or boxes, often nonmovable and integral with the finish of a building.

A container in which to grow plants.

Dansk (Danish)
n. - plantageejer, plantemester

Nederlands (Dutch)
boer, eigenaar van plantage, plant-/ zaaimachine, grote pot voor sierplant

Français (French)
n. - planteur (personne), planteuse (machine), jardinière, cache-pot

Deutsch (German)
n. - Pflanzer, Sämaschine

Ελληνική (Greek)
n. - καλλιεργητής, μεγάλη γλάστρα, σέρα, φυτευτήρι, φυτευτική μηχανή

Italiano (Italian)
piantatore

Português (Portuguese)
n. - plantador (m), fazendeiro (m), colono (m), semeadeira (f)

Русский (Russian)
плантатор, сажалка

Español (Spanish)
n. - plantador, cultivador

Svenska (Swedish)
n. - plantageägare, odlare, planteringsmaskin

中文（简体）(Chinese (Simplified))
种植者, 殖民者, 耕作者

中文（繁體）(Chinese (Traditional))
n. - 種植者, 殖民者, 耕作者

한국어 (Korean)
n. - 경작자, 파종기, 수중목

日本語 (Japanese)
n. - 植える人, 農園主, プランター, 種まき機

العربيه (Arabic)
‏(الاسم) فلاح, مزارع, صاحب مزرعه‏

עברית (Hebrew)
n. - ‮עובד-אדמה, עציץ, אדנית, בעל מטעים, מטען, מזרעה‬

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