take hold

idiomatic phrase

1

: to grasp, grip, or seize something

took hold and hung on tight

—often used with of

take hold of the railing

… she took hold of his arm with both her hands, and looked up eagerly—oh, with such terrible eagerness!—into his face.

—Anthony Trollope

—often used figuratively

As word of the subpoenas spread … confusion and hysteria took hold of the social set …

—Bob Colacello

I did not want Merlin to retire from the job until I was ready to take hold of it effectively myself …

—Mark Twain

2

: to become effective, established, or popular

The change in the law has not yet taken hold.

… a swath of land that has been spared from lava flows long enough that rich vegetation has had a chance to take hold.

—G. Brad Lewis

… here in central California the French aesthetic has recently taken hold.

—Rebecca Coffey

Examples of take hold in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Instead, those remnants took hold in each evolving online technology – chat rooms, social media and video – and today spark obsessive online interest among a generation that wasn’t even alive at the time of the attack. —USA TODAY, 18 Apr. 2024

Despite the theory being widely debunked, the conspiracy has taken hold in MAGA and increasingly mainstream right-wing circles, with speaker of the House Mike Johnson recently announcing a bill to prevent noncitizens from voting in elections—even though that is not an issue. —David Gilbert, WIRED, 18 Apr. 2024

In the 1980s, concerns about bovine spongiform encephalopathy — or mad cow disease — took hold across Europe, when cases of the incurable and invariably fatal neurodegenerative disease of cattle began to appear. —Susanne Rust, Los Angeles Times, 18 Apr. 2024

The nerve-racking scenario takes hold of one’s anxieties and sets the tone for an unsettling ride, which IFC will release theatrically before the film streams on Shudder. —Carlos Aguilar, Variety, 16 Apr. 2024

Russia-Ukraine war: Russian regime propaganda has taken hold in America’s political conversation, with some pro-Trump Republicans often echoing Moscow’s line on why Ukraine is a hopeless cause. —Elizabeth Both, NBC News, 15 Apr. 2024

But on the next all-new Boeing airplane, the 787 Dreamliner, a different development model took hold, with suppliers doing much of the detailed design work. —Tribune News Service, The Mercury News, 10 Apr. 2024

That project failed to take hold, and Willis eventually steered her focus back to music. —Brian McCollum, Detroit Free Press, 7 Apr. 2024

New Line’s latest Final Destination movie has lined up some fresh young blood for Death to take hold of. —Borys Kit, The Hollywood Reporter, 28 Mar. 2024

Word History

First Known Use

1530, in the meaning defined at sense 1