Grasp
late Middle English: perhaps related to grope.
wiktionary
From Middle English graspen, grapsen, craspen(“to grope; feel around”), from Old English *grǣpsian, from Proto-West Germanic *graipisōn, from Proto-Germanic *graipisōną. Cognate with German Low German grapsen(“to grab; grasp”), Saterland Frisian Grapse(“double handful”), Old English grāpian("to touch, feel, grasp"; > Modern English grope). Compare also Swedish krafsa(“to scatch; scabble”), Norwegian krafse(“to scramble”).
etymonline
grasp (v.)
mid-14c., "to reach, grope, feel around," possibly a metathesis of grapsen, from Old English *græpsan "to touch, feel," from Proto-Germanic *grap-, *grab- (source also of East Frisian grapsen "to grasp," Middle Dutch grapen "to seize, grasp," Old English grapian "to touch, feel, grope"), from PIE root *ghrebh- (1) "to seize, reach" (see grab (v.)). With verb-formative -s- as in cleanse. Sense of "seize" first recorded mid-16c. Transitive use by 17c. Figurative use from c. 1600; of intellectual matters from 1680s. Related: Grasped; grasping.
grasp (n.)
1560s, "a handle," from grasp (v.). As "act of grasping" from c. 1600; also "power of grasping." Meaning "power of intellect" is from 1680s.
Ah, but a man's reach should exceed his grasp,
Or what's a heaven for?
[Browning, "Andrea del Sarto"]
