Word.ws English Dictionary

undergirding

undergirding is the present participle and gerund of undergird.

Meaning of undergird

Verb

undergird (third-person singular simple present undergirds, present participle undergirding, simple past and past participle undergirded or undergirt)

  1. To strengthen, secure, or reinforce by passing a rope, cable, or chain around the underside of an object.
  2. (figuratively) To give fundamental support; provide with a sound or secure basis; provide supportive evidence for.
    • For fiction, documentary, verse, and essay, she undergirds entertaining images and stories with profound themes of ecological responsibility and challenge to the suppression of human rights.2015, Mary Ellen Snodgrass, Barbara Kingsolver: A Literary Companion, McFarland, →ISBN, page 3
  3. To lend moral support to.
  4. To secure below or underneath.

Questions about undergirding

What is undergirding the present participle and gerund of?
Undergirding is the present participle and gerund of undergird.

Words near undergirding in the dictionary

  1. underget
  2. undergets
  3. undergetting
  4. undergird
  5. undergirded
  6. undergirding
  7. undergirds
  8. undergirt
  9. underglaze
  10. underglazed
  11. underglazes

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: undergirding (page history and authors); undergird (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: “undergirding.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/undergirding. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.