prehending

Verb

prehend (third-person singular simple present prehends, present participle prehending, simple past and past participle prehended)

1. (transitive) To perceive in the manner of Alfred North Whitehead's concept of prehension.
   • Each of the four levels "prehends" the other, and so in the punning of words so frequent in hieroglyphic writing, we encounter a richer and more inclusive mode of thought than we are accustomed to.1981, William Irwin Thompson, The Time Falling Bodies Take to Light: Mythology, Sexuality and the Origins of Culture, London: Rider/Hutchinson & Co., page 214
2. (obsolete, transitive) To lay hold of; to seize.
   • Here they be all three now ; prehend 'em , officersc. 1615-1617, Thomas Middleton, The Widow