Sustaining

How to spell sustaining

10 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce sustaining

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does sustaining mean?

1. verbKeeping something going over time, or supporting and maintaining it without letting it fail.
2. adjectiveActing to keep something alive, strong, or in good condition.

Sustaining in a sentence

• verb

  The charity is sustaining its food programme through winter with new donations.

• adjective

  The porridge made a warm and sustaining breakfast before the hike.

• verb

  These thick beams are sustaining the entire weight of the roof.

• adjective

  Volunteers play a sustaining role in keeping the clinic open.

Where does sustaining come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This is the present participle of 'sustain', which English took from the Old French sostenir or sustenir in the 1300s. That French verb descended from the Latin sustinere, a compound of sub, meaning 'up from below' or 'under', and tenere, meaning 'to hold'. The literal sense was therefore 'to hold up' or 'to bear the weight of something from beneath', which is exactly how we still use it when something sustains a structure or keeps a person going. The same tenere root holds up a whole family of English words, including 'retain', 'contain', 'detain' and 'tenacious', all of which share that hidden -tain or -ten spelling. Knowing that the middle is the holding root tenere helps you remember the -tain spelling rather than writing it phonetically as -ten.

How the word is built

• sus- (from sub-: up from below, from under)
• -tain (from Latin tenere: to hold)
• -ing (present participle / adjective suffix)