sapping

== English == === Verb === sapping present participle and gerund of sap === Noun === sapping (plural sappings) The act by which something is sapped or depleted. December 22, 1821, Joseph Story, Address Delivered Before the Members of the New-England Society, in Charleston [The government] may be destroyed by popular violence, or the madness of party, or the deeper sappings of corruption. The act of excavating trenches. The act of striking with a sap or club.