Both Uses
comprehend
in
The Secret Hour
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- Jessica was pretty sure she understood what Mr. Sanchez had covered in chapter two, but a few concepts kept popping up that were just incomprehensible.†
Chpt 5 *incomprehensible = not understandablestandard prefix: The prefix "in-" in incomprehensible means not and reverses the meaning of comprehensible. This is the same pattern you see in words like invisible, incomplete, and insecure.
- Jessica looked at it uncomprehendingly.†
Chpt 29uncomprehendingly = without understandingstandard prefix: The prefix "un-" in uncomprehendingly means not and reverses the meaning of comprehendingly. This is the same pattern you see in words like unhappy, unknown, and unlucky.
Definitions:
-
(1)
(comprehend) to understand something -- especially to understand it completely
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(2)
(meaning too rare to warrant focus) Much more rarely (and more frequently in the past), comprehend can mean to include as part of something broader. That was the first sense of the word listed in Webster's Dictionary of 1828 with this sample sentence: "The empire of Great Britain comprehends England, Scotland and Ireland, with their dependencies."