Word.ws English Dictionary

stand on the shoulders of

stand on the shoulders of verb: to build on the previous works and gains of.

Verb

stand on the shoulders of (third-person singular simple present stands on the shoulders of, present participle standing on the shoulders of, simple past and past participle stood on the shoulders of)

  1. (idiomatic) To build on the previous works and gains of.

Forms of stand on the shoulders of

third-person singular presentstands on the shoulders of
present participlestanding on the shoulders of
past participlestood on the shoulders of
paststood on the shoulders of

Origin of stand on the shoulders of

Clipping of stand on the shoulders of giants.

Questions about stand on the shoulders of

What does stand on the shoulders of mean?
Stand on the shoulders of means to build on the previous works and gains of.
What part of speech is stand on the shoulders of?
Stand on the shoulders of is a verb.
What is the past tense of stand on the shoulders of?
The past tense of stand on the shoulders of is stood on the shoulders of.

Words near stand on the shoulders of in the dictionary

  1. stand on one's dignity
  2. stand on one's head
  3. stand on one's own bottom
  4. stand on one's own two feet
  5. stand on someone's shoulders
  6. stand on the shoulders of
  7. stand on the shoulders of giants
  8. stand on velvet
  9. stand one's ground
  10. stand one's hand
  11. stand out

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: stand on the shoulders of (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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