Dictionary

apprehension

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin apprehensio, compare with French appréhension.

Pronunciation

(British) IPA: /æp.ɹɪˈhɛn.ʃən/
(America) IPA: /æp.ɹiˈhɛn.ʃən/

Noun

apprehension

(rare) The physical act of seizing or taking hold of (something); seizing.
- 2006, Phil Senter, "Comparison of Forelimb Function between Deinonychus and Babiraptor (Theropoda: Dromaeosauridea)", Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology, vol. 26, no. 4 (Dec.), p. 905:
  The wing would have been a severe obstruction to apprehension of an object on the ground.
(legal) The act of seizing or taking by legal process; arrest.
- 1855, Elizabeth Gaskell, chapter 37, in North and South:
  The warrant had been issued for his apprehension on the charge of rioting.
- 1852 March – 1853 September, Charles Dickens, Bleak House, London: Bradbury and Evans, […], published 1853, →OCLC ↗:
  When he told us that a large reward was offered by Sir Leicester Dedlock for the murderer's apprehension, I did not in my first consternation understand why; […]
Perception; the act of understanding using one's intellect without affirming, denying, or passing any judgment
- 1815, Percy Bysshe Shelley, “On Life,”, in A Defence of Poetry and Other Essays, published 1840:
  We live on, and in living we lose the apprehension of life.
Opinion; conception; sentiment; idea.
- 1901, Kate Douglas Wiggin, chapter 8, in Penelope's English Experiences:
  We think we get a kind of vague apprehension of what London means from the top of a 'bus better than anywhere else.
The faculty by which ideas are conceived or by which perceptions are grasped; understanding.
- 1854, Charles Dickens, chapter 7, in Hard Times:
  Strangers of limited information and dull apprehension were sometimes observed not to know what a Powler was.
Anticipation, especially of unfavorable things such as dread or fear or the prospect of something unpleasant in the future.
- 1846, Herman Melville, chapter 32, in Typee: A Peep at Polynesian Life:
  Every circumstance which evinced the savage nature of the beings at whose mercy I was, augmented the fearful apprehensions that consumed me.