Defending

How to spell defending

9 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce defending

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does defending mean?

1. verbProtecting someone or something from attack, harm, or criticism; arguing in support of a position.

Defending in a sentence

• The lawyer spent the morning defending her client against the fraud charge.

• The troops were defending the bridge through the night.

Where does defending come from?

Language of origin: Latin

The word traces back to the Latin verb defendere, which literally meant 'to ward off' or 'to strike away', formed from the prefix de- ('off, away') and the verb fendere ('to strike or hit'). That same fendere root also gives English 'offend' and 'fence', and the act of building a fence is quite literally a way of warding something off. English took the word through Old French defendre during the 1200s, when it carried both the sense of protecting and the older legal sense of forbidding. Over time the protective meaning came to dominate, so that to defend something is to guard it against attack or argument. The present participle 'defending' simply adds the -ing ending, and the single f and single d after 'de-' are the spots writers occasionally second-guess, even though the spelling is regular.

How the word is built

• de- (off, away)
• fend (to strike or ward off)
• -ing (present participle suffix)