What does sundering mean?
Sundering means splitting something apart or breaking a connection between people, places, or things. It often suggests a forceful or decisive separation: a rock may be sundered by an explosion, or an argument may sunder a friendship or political alliance. The word has a literary, weighty tone and is less common in everyday speech than alternatives such as split, divide, break, or separate. Its participial form is especially frequent in descriptions of destruction and abrupt rupture, such as a storm sundering trees or a decision sundering an organization into rival factions. Although sundering can describe physical division, it is also used figuratively for the loss of unity within families, communities, institutions, or alliances. The word is best suited to contexts in which the separation is vivid, consequential, or portrayed as dramatic.
Splitting or separating something into distinct parts, especially by force.
"The blast sundered the timber supports."
Usually literary or dramatic; the present participle is more common than other inflected forms in current usage.
Serving to split, divide, or break apart something.
"The storm left the coast littered with sundering timbers."
Chiefly literary and usually found before a noun.
A single fracture can sunder even the strongest bond.
Reviewed by Deb Chak, Editor. AI-assisted content curated by RJS Tech Solutions LLP.
Where does sundering come from?
The word comes from the Old English verb sundor, meaning “to split” or “divide,” related to an Old English element also underlying the archaic phrase asunder. The form sunder developed in Middle English, while the modern base sundering is the present participle of sunder. The word has relatives in other Germanic languages, including forms related to Old High German sundar, “apart.”
Related word forms
How sundering is actually used
Literary and somewhat dramatic; in ordinary use, split, separate, or sever is often more direct. The form is most often encountered as the present participle of sunder.
Easily confused with sundering
Sundering means splitting or separating, whereas sounding means making a noise or measuring the depth of water.