Apprehended

How to spell apprehended

11 letters · 4 syllables

How to pronounce apprehended

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does apprehended mean?

1. verbPast tense of apprehend: caught and arrested someone, especially by the authorities.
2. verbPast tense of apprehend: understood or grasped the meaning of something.

Apprehended in a sentence

• Police apprehended the suspect at the border crossing.

• She instantly apprehended the gravity of the budget shortfall.

• The security team apprehended the shoplifter near the exit.

• He had not fully apprehended the risks before signing the contract.

Where does apprehended come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word descends from the Latin verb apprehendere, which literally meant 'to seize' or 'to lay hold of', formed from the prefix ad- 'to, toward' and the verb prehendere 'to grasp or catch'. English took it in through Old French aprehender during the late 1300s, and the earliest English uses leaned on the physical idea of grabbing or capturing someone. From that bodily sense of seizing, the word stretched in two directions: a person could be physically caught (as by the law), or an idea could be mentally 'grasped', that is, understood. The same prehendere root also gives us 'comprehend' (to grasp fully) and even 'prison' and 'prey', all sharing the notion of taking hold. The doubled p in the spelling preserves the assimilated ad- prefix, where the d shifted to match the following p, which is the trap many writers miss.

How the word is built

• ap- (to, toward; from Latin ad-)
• prehend (seize, grasp)
• -ed (past tense)