Search the Dictionary

A place to stand upon; a locus standi; hence, a foundation or basis for operations.

ticularly celebrated. One of these, issued by Charles VII. of France, A. D. 1438, was the foundation of the liberties of the Gallican church; the other, issued by Charles VI. of Germany, A. D. 1724, settled his hereditary dominions on his eldest daughter, the Archduchess Maria Theresa.

Hence: Of or pertaining to the root or origin; reaching to the center, to the foundation to the ultimate sources to the principles, or the like: original; fundamental; thorough-going; unsparing; extreme; as, radical evils; radical reform; a radical party. The most determined exertions of that authority, against them, o…

ng or driving. A ditch . . . was filled with some sound materials, and rammed to make the foundation solid. Arbuthnot.

empty declamation; bombast; as, the rant of fanatics. This is a stoical rant, without any foundation in the nature of man or reason of things. Atterbury.

To subvert from the foundation; to lay level with the ground; to destroy; to demolish. The royal hand that razed unhappy Troy. Dryden.

edits. Shak. A theory, which, how much soever it may relish of wit and invention, hath no foundation in nature. Woodward.

To part or tear off forcibly; to take away by force. An empire from its old foundations rent. Dryden. I will surely rend the kingdom from thee. 1 Kings xi. 11. To rap and rend. See under Rap, v. t., to snatch.

In lace, a ground or foundation of regular meshes, like network.

A foundation or sustaining wall of stones thrown together without order, as in deep water or on a soft bottom.

In railroads, the bed or foundation on which the superstructure (ties, rails, etc.) rests; in common roads, the whole material laid in place and ready for travel.

of colors. "Sad-colored clothes." Walton. Woad, or wade, is used by the dyers to lay the foundation of all sad colors. Mortimer.

To subvert by digging or wearing away; to mine; to undermine; to destroy the foundation of. Nor safe their dwellings were, for sapped by floods, Their houses fell upon their household gods. Dryden.

In English universities, an undergraduate who belongs to the foundation of a college, and receives support in part from its revenues.

Maintenance for a scholar; a foundation for the support of a student. T. Warton.

To fix; to set firm. From their foundations, loosening to and fro, They plucked the seated hills. Milton.

titude; to give site or place to; to place; to put; to fix; as, to set a house on a stone foundation; to set a book on a shelf; to set a dish on a table; to set a chest or trunk on its bottom or on end. I do set my bow in the cloud. Gen. ix. 13.

To sink gradually to a lower level; to subside, as the foundation of a house, etc.

The gradual sinking of a building, whether by the yielding of the ground under the foundation, or by the compression of the joints or the material. (b) pl.

The basis or foundation of a thing; especially, a horizontal piece, as a timber, which forms the lower member of a frame, or supports a structure; as, the sills of a house, of a bridge, of a loom, and the like. Hence: