a. and sb. [f. L. transmigrānt-, ppl. stem of transmigrāre: see next.]
A. adj. That transmigrates. rare.
1654. Gayton, Pleas. Notes, III. iii. 82. Such an Agonie and maw-Convulsions, that he thought his soule had been transmigrant and Errant from his Body.
1888. Athenæum, 24 Nov., 695/2. They proceed to tell a secular story of transmigrant souls.
B. sb. † 1. orig. One who transmigrates or leaves his own land and dwells in another: including the two notions of ‘emigrant’ and ‘immigrant.’
1622. Bacon, Holy War, Wks. 1879, I. 529/1. There are other bands of society, and implicit confederations. That of colonies, or transmigrants, towards their mother nation.
2. In recent use: A person passing through a country or place on his way from the country from which he is an emigrant to that in which he will be an immigrant. Used spec. in reference to the Aliens Act of 1905: see quot.
1894. Willis, in Rep. Bd. of Trade recent Immigr. fr. E. Europe, 10. The immigrants of [Russian and Polish] nationality formed … in 1892, 64 per cent. of all aliens (not being seamen and not known to be transmigrants) shown … to have come here from Hamburg.
1905. Form of Return under Aliens Act. A. Immigration Ports. Aliens Act, 1905. Transmigrants. That is, alien passengers (other than first-class passengers), who have in their possession prepaid through tickets, and in respect of whom security has been given that they will proceed to places outside the United Kingdom.
1910. Daily News, 26 Feb., 4/2. Practically no aliens now arrive in this country for the purpose of settling here; they are nearly all transmigrants proceeding via England from the Continent to America.
b. Also said of migratory birds.
3. A soul that transmigrates.
1882. in Ogilvie (Annandale).
