basic vs foundational

basic

adj
  • Elementary, simple, fundamental, merely functional. 

  • Of or pertaining to a base; having a pH greater than 7. 

  • Unremarkable or uninteresting; boring; uncool. 

  • Necessary, essential for life or some process. 

noun
  • An elementary building block, e.g. a fundamental piece of knowledge. 

  • A necessary commodity, a staple requirement. 

  • Basic training. 

foundational

adj
  • fundamental or underlying 

  • of, or relating to a foundation or foundations 

How often have the words basic and foundational occurred in a corpus of books? (source: Google Ngram Viewer )