apprehend
Definitions
To arrest someone, especially a criminal
逮捕，拘押
To understand or grasp a meaning (formal)
领会，理解（正式）
To anticipate something with anxiety (literary)
忧虑地预料（文学用法）
Root Breakdown
Root-derivedap- (a form of ad-, toward) + prehend (seize) = to lay hold of, to grab. It kept both a body sense and a mind sense: police apprehend a suspect (grab the person), and you apprehend a meaning (grab the idea). The same metaphor, when aimed at an uncertain future you can't get a grip on, produced the anxious sense behind apprehensive.
Root prehens still carries 16 more wordsWhy It Means This
apprehend is a small museum of the root's whole journey. The arrest sense is the literal grab. The 'understand' sense is the grab turned mental — the same leap as comprehend. And the 'anticipate with fear' sense is the grab failing: when the future keeps slipping out of your hands, you grow uneasy, which is how apprehension came to mean dread.
Example Sentences
- 1.
Police apprehended the suspect near the border.
- 2.
It is hard to apprehend the full scale of the disaster.
- 3.
She seemed to apprehend danger long before anyone else.