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underset

verb, noun — 3 senses

underset

verb

Etymology From Middle English undersetten, from Old English undersettan (“to put, place, or set under, put in the place of another, substitute, falsify, forge, counterfeit, place as a pledge, hypothecate, add, annex, subjoin, make subject, submit, set beneath, esteem less”), equivalent to under- + set. Cognate with Dutch ondersetten (“to put beneath”), German untersetzen (“to put beneath, pin”).

1

To set under or beneath.

  • How it was shaped up with proper foreway and under-set for dished wheels, or how iron "clouts" (with "clout-nails") were carefully fitted into it to take the wear — is all but gone from my memory, as indeed it was hardly worth storing [...]1963, George Sturt, The Wheelwright's Shop:
2

To prop or support.

  • being a company at that time , and well underset with rich men , and good order1622, Francis, Lord Verulam, Viscount St. Alban [i.e. Francis Bacon], The Historie of the Raigne of King Henry the Seventh, […], London: […] W[illiam] Stansby for Matthew Lownes, and William Barret, →OCLC:
  • Unless posts are underset in very steep mines they are apt to fall out before the pressure of the roof has tightened them. Posts are sometimes too much underset, owing to their being too long.1887, Arthur Robert Sawyer, Accidents in mines in the North Staffordshire coalfield arising from falls of roof and sides:
Derived terms
undersetter

underset

noun

Etymology From Middle English undersetten, from Old English undersettan (“to put, place, or set under, put in the place of another, substitute, falsify, forge, counterfeit, place as a pledge, hypothecate, add, annex, subjoin, make subject, submit, set beneath, esteem less”), equivalent to under- + set. Cognate with Dutch ondersetten (“to put beneath”), German untersetzen (“to put beneath, pin”).

1

undercurrent (of water)

Entry derived from the Wiktionary, under licence CC BY-SA 4.0 — list of authors.