Replate

Part of speech: verb

Definitions

1. To coat the surface of an object with a layer of metal such as chrome, nickel, or gold ; to apply a fresh metal coating to an already-plated object that has worn or tarnished
2. To cover with a thin layer of metal deposited electrochemically or otherwise ; to restore a metal coating to something previously plated but now requiring renewal
3. To apply an electrolytic or chemical metal finish to a surface ; to restore or reapply a protective or decorative metal layer to an object that has lost its original plating

Etymology: "Replate" is a straightforward formation: the prefix "re-", meaning "again" or "anew", attached to "plate". Nothing in its history is hidden, so the story is really the story of "plate" itself, which reaches English by a long chain of borrowings. The root traces back to an ancient Greek adjective, "platys", meaning "broad" or "flat", a sense that survives in words like "platypus", the "flat-footed" animal. That adjective passed into Latin as "platta" in the spoken, popular form, and then into Old French as "plate", meaning a flat piece of metal or a flat dish. English borrowed "plate" from Old French in the Middle English period, and it kept the sense of a flat sheet of metal, then came to mean a flat vessel for food. Adding "re-" produces the verb's core meaning: to coat or cover a surface again with a thin layer of metal, most often a precious one.

Synonyms: plate again, re-coat