From OE 'healdan' — originally 'to tend livestock,' evolving through 'guard' and 'keep' to the modern sense of grasping.
To grasp, carry, or support with one's hands or arms; to keep or maintain in a particular state or position.
From Old English 'healdan' meaning 'to hold, keep, guard, contain, possess,' from Proto-Germanic *haldaną (to tend, herd, watch over), possibly from PIE root *kel- (to drive, set in motion). The original Germanic sense was not about gripping with the hand but about herding and guarding livestock — the shift from 'tend, watch over' to 'grasp, keep' happened within Germanic as the concept of keeping evolved from watching animals to physically possessing things. Key roots: *haldaną (Proto-Germanic: "to tend, herd, guard").