Word.ws English Dictionary

lays a foundation

lays a foundation is the third-person singular simple present indicative of lay a foundation.

Meaning of lay a foundation

Verb

lay a foundation (third-person singular simple present lays a foundation, present participle laying a foundation, simple past and past participle laid a foundation)

  1. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see lay, foundation.
  2. To elicit information from a witness to show that the witness has knowledge of a matter before the witness testifies to the matter itself.
    • In order to lay a foundation for the witness to describe the murder, the prosecutor first had to show that the witness was present when the murder occurred.
  3. (figuratively) To make a start.
    • You should lay a foundation, even if you can't finish the project.

Questions about lays a foundation

What is lays a foundation the third-person singular simple present indicative of?
Lays a foundation is the third-person singular simple present indicative of lay a foundation.

Words near lays a foundation in the dictionary

  1. laypeople
  2. layperson
  3. laypersons
  4. lays
  5. lays a finger on
  6. lays a foundation
  7. lays a glove on
  8. lays a hand on
  9. lays about
  10. lays an anchor to the windward
  11. lays an egg

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: lays a foundation (page history and authors); lay a foundation (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “lays a foundation.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/lays_a_foundation. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.