Metamorphosis
late Middle English: via Latin from Greek metamorphōsis, from metamorphoun ‘transform, change shape’.
wiktionary
First attested in 1533, from Latin metamorphōsis, from Ancient Greek μεταμόρφωσις(metamórphōsis), from μετά(metá, “change”) + μορφή(morphḗ, “form”). Analyzable as meta- + -morph + -osis
etymonline
metamorphosis (n.)
1530s, "change of form or structure, action or process of changing in form," originally especially by witchcraft, from Latin metamorphosis, from Greek metamorphōsis "a transforming, a transformation," from metamorphoun "to transform, to be transfigured," from meta, here indicating "change" (see meta-) + morphē "shape, form," a word of uncertain etymology.
The biological sense of "extensive transformations an animal (especially an insect) undergoes after it leaves the egg" is from 1660s. As the title of Ovid's work, late 14c., Metamorphoseos, from Latin Metamorphoses (plural).
