non-terrestrial adj.

not found on or originating from Earth

  • 1849 Chemistry of the Stars in British Quarterly Review 1 Nov. 322 page image

    If the stars are inhabited, is it probable that the dwellers on them resemble those on this star, or Earth, or is it more likely that they are non-terrestrial beings, unlike us, and our plant, and animal companions, and different in different stars?

  • 1885 Modern Marvels in The Spectator 17 Oct. 1365/1 (review of H. R. Haggard’s King Solomon’s Mines)

    ‘Magic’—that is, the suspension of the natural forces through individual will or knowledge, displayed sometimes by means akin in form to chemical transmutations, sometimes by intercourse with spiritual, or at least non-terrestrial, beings.

  • 1931 E. M. Johnston & C. A. Smith The Planet Entity in Wonder Stories Quarterly Fall 112/1 page image Clark Ashton Smith E. M. Johnston bibliography

    When…the local observatories issued a bulletin saying that the vessel had been sighted approaching the earth from translunar space on the previous night, the fact of its non[-]terrestrial genesis became established beyond dispute in the eyes of most.

  • 1932 C. A. Smith Testament of Athammaus in Weird Tales Oct. 515/2 page image Clark Ashton Smith bibliography

    As for me, my scientific turn of mind, which repudiated the supernatural, led me to seek an explanation of the problem in the non-terrestrial side of Knygathin Zhaum’s ancestry. I felt sure that the forces of an alien biology, the properties of a trans-stellar life-substance, were somehow involved.

  • 1936 H. P. Lovecraft Shadow Out of Time in Astounding Stories June 147/2 page image H. P. Lovecraft bibliography

    It came to me that this was the language used by a captive mind I had known slightly, in my dreams—a mind from a large asteroid on which had survived much of the archaic life and lore of the primal planet whereof it formed a fragment. At the same time I recalled that this level of the archives was devoted to volumes dealing with the non-Terrestrial planets.

  • 1950 J. Bixby —And All For One’ in Other Worlds May 71/2 page image Jerome Bixby bibliography

    Greenberg gave them a boiling in three languages, all non-terrestrial.

  • 1960 J. Brunner Atlantic Abomination x. 59 John Brunner bibliography

    You may have heard by now that the biologists assign a nonterrestrial origin to the creature you brought up from Atlantica.

  • 1970 J. Blish Spock Must Die! xiii. 97 James Blish bibliography

    And your non-terrestrial friend Mr. Spock as well.

  • 1992 E. Hutt Letter in Isaac Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine Oct. 13/1 page image

    The protagonist’s personal struggle with grief; domes on the moon; non-terrestrial lifeforms; overseeing, meddling superbeings; the awesome concept of life, and civilization, within a star! A great story!

  • 2004 P. F. Hamilton Pandora's Star iv. 99 Peter F. Hamilton bibliography

    A lot of the plant species were certainly non-terrestrial.

Research requirements

antedating 1849
Research History
Mike Christie submitted cites from Astounding Science Fiction from 1943 and 1945.
Jeff Prucher submitted a cite from a 1962 reprint of Clark Ashton Smith's "The Testament of Athammaus"; Fred Galvin verified it in the story's first printing in Weird Tales in 1932.
Douglas Winston submitted a cite from John Brunner's 1960 "the Atlantic Abomination".
Jeff Prucher submitted a cite from a 2002 reprint of Keith Laumer's 1964 "Wicker Wonderland", but the cite does not appear in the 1965 first publication.
Fred Galvin submitted a 1950 cite from Jerome Bixby's "—And All For One'" (the title of which does, in fact, have an unmatched quotation mark)
Fred Galvin submitted a cite from a 1990 reprint of H.P. Lovecraft's "The Shadow Out of Time": Mike Christie verified this in its first publication (Astounding Stories, June 1936).
Simon Koppel submitted an 1849 cite from the British Quarterly Review.
Simon Koppel submitted an 1885 cite from the Civil and Military Gazette (Lahore); Jesse Sheidlower verified it in the original publication in The Spectator.

Last modified 2023-04-18 17:20:31
In the compilation of some entries, HDSF has drawn extensively on corresponding entries in OED.