[f. SUPER- 3 + STRUCTURE, after superstruct, superstruction. Cf. F. superstructure (from 18th c.).] That which is built upon something else as a foundation; a structure raised upon something.
1. lit. A building considered in relation to its foundation; an upper part of a building, erected upon a lower supporting part; any material structure resting on something else as a foundation.
c. 1645. Howell, Lett., I. II. xv. (1892), 126. In som Places, as in Amsterdam, the Foundation costs more than the Superstructure.
1679. Moxon, Mech. Exerc., viii. 137. Though the Ground-plates … be part of the Carcass, yet I thought fit … they should be laid, before I treated of the superstructure.
1738. Gentl. Mag., VIII. 378/2. The City Surveyor … declared … that it would be beneficial to the Superstructure to have the Foundation laid early.
1813. Vancouver, Agric. Devon, 89. It frequently happens, that the lower part of the building is made of stone, and its superstructure of cob.
1868. Lyell, Princ. Geol., xli. (ed. 10), II. 404. The accumulation of the subaërial superstructure of the great cone.
1876. Encycl. Brit., IV. 284/1. The superstructure of a bridge consists of the roadway and the beam, arch, or chain used to carry the roadway from support to support.
b. Railway Engineering. (See quot.)
1864. Webster, Superstructure,… the sleepers, rails, and fastenings, in distinction from the road-bed;—called also permanent-way.
2. fig. or in fig. context: An immaterial structure, as of thought, action, etc., figured as being built upon something else as a foundation.
1641. J. Jackson, True Evang. T., III. 224. Lay a good foundation, and then the superstructure is like to stand.
1646. J. Hall, Horæ Vac., 20. Thrift … is … the Base whereon the Superstructures of all other wisdome lyes.
1698. Norris, Pract. Disc. (1711), III. 2. In Geometry some plain Propositions are laid down,… in order to further Theory, which, as a Superstructure, is to be rais’d upon those Foundations.
1791. Cowper, Yardley Oak, 122. So stands a kingdom, whose foundation yet Fails not, in virtue and in wisdom laid, Through all the superstructure.
1840. Macaulay, Ess., Ranke’s Hist. (1897), 549. Every fresh story is as solid a basis for a new superstructure as the original foundation was.
1905. J. B. Bury, Life St. Patrick, App. 276. The visit to Pope Celestine at Rome has no legendary superstructure.
