vbl. sb. [f. as prec.]
1. The action of supporting or strengthening a building, etc., from beneath. (See UNDERPIN v. 1.)
1489. in Dugdale, Monast. (1821), III. 359/2. Paid for a grounsell for the kechyn wall and for underpynnyng and leiyng in of the same, xv d.
1493–4. Rec. St. Mary at Hill, 198. Payd for vndyrpynyng of Mastres Atclyffe ys pewe, vj d. Ibid. Payd … for vndyrpynny[n]g of þe newe pewys.
1528. MS. Acc. St. John’s Hosp., Canterb. Paid to a tyler for stanchonyng, dobyng, & vnderpynnyng of the store house.
1707. Mortimer, Husb., 304. Underpinning for the Bricklayer to dig the Foundation … is a Penny a foot.
1842. Gwilt, Archit., Gloss. 1049.
1883. Gresley, Gloss Coal-m., 267. Underpinning, building up the walling of a pit-shaft to join that above it.
2. The materials or structure used for giving support to a building from beneath.
1538. Elyot, Substructio, vnderpynnynge or groundyng of a house.
1601. Holland, Pliny, II. 575. When Cambyses … burnt all before him, as farre as to the very foundation and underpinning of the Obeliske.
1668. Wilkins, Real Char., 256. Foundation,… Base, Bottom, fundamental, underpinning.
1741. Phil. Trans., XLI. 852. [The houses] were all, in a manner, rocked quite off from their Underpinnings.
1789. Massachusetts Spy, 16 July, 3/4. A new frame of a barn, uncovered,… was taken by a whirlwind from its underpinning.
1894. Howells, Traveller fr. Altruria, vi. The people meant to winter there, however, for the sod was banked up against the wooden underpinning.
b. fig. A support or prop.
1589. R. Harvey, Pl. Perc., 3. They are like to daunce after his pipe, and set themselues vpon a miry pinne,… till his vnderpinning will faile him, I doubt.
1656. Artif. Handsom., 7. Those grosse Solœcismes of Art, which by unseasonable … affectations (as so many pitifull props and underpinnings) strive in vain to skrew and set up lapsed and tottering age.
1774. Burke, Sp. Amer. Tax., Wks. 1842, I. 160. That this house … is itself held up only by the treacherous under-pinning and clumsy buttresses of arbitrary power.
a. 1894. in Sunday Reform Leaflets (Columbus), Sept., 6. The moral underpinning requisite to sustain the superstructure of man’s rights.
