Overstrengthening

Part of speech: verb

Definitions

1. The act of making something stronger or more reinforced than necessary
2. Increasing the strength of an object or structure beyond its required limits
3. Providing more support or durability than is needed, resulting in an overly strong condition

Etymology: Overstrengthening is a plain English formation with no dramatic backstory: the prefix "over-", meaning excessively, attached to "strengthening", the present participle of "strengthen". "Strengthen" itself comes from "strength" with the verb-forming suffix "-en", which English has used since Old English to turn adjectives and nouns into verbs, as in "lengthen", "harden" and "widen". "Strength" traces back to Old English "strengthu", a noun built from "strang", meaning strong. The "over-" prefix is very old in English and was productive in Old English, so compounds like "overstrengthen" could be formed freely whenever a speaker wanted to describe going beyond a proper degree of something. The word is therefore a transparent, rarely used coinage that simply stacks familiar parts together rather than a term with a notable first user or a shifted meaning.

Synonyms: overreinforcing, overbolstering

Antonyms: understrengthening, underreinforcing