Repopulated

Part of speech: verb

Definitions

1. To fill an area once more with residents after it has been deserted
2. To occupy a place with people again after it was emptied
3. To bring new inhabitants into a previously vacated location

Etymology: "Repopulated" is the past tense and past participle of "repopulate," so the real story belongs to the verb itself. Its base, "populate," came into English from Latin "populare," meaning to people or to lay waste, a sense that shows up in the older Latin root "populus," the people. The prefix "re-" means "again," and it was attached to "populate" in English to describe filling a place with inhabitants once more. The prefix has a longer past than the verb. "Re-" descends from Latin "re-," which passed through Old French "re-" into Middle English, and English keeps it as a productive element, so "repopulate" is built the same way as "rebuild" or "reopen." Its form is a plain combination of two parts that were already in English, which makes it a straightforward compound rather than a borrowing of a whole word.

Synonyms: resettled, reinhabited, restored, refilled, reoccupied

Antonyms: abandoned, deserted, evacuated