Grope

From Middle English gropien, from Old English grÄpian, related to grÄ«pan (whence English gripe); cf. also grip.

Full definition of grope

(obsolete) To feel with or use the hands; to handle.
To search or attempt to find something in the dark, or, as a blind person, by feeling; to move about hesitatingly, as in darkness or obscurity; to feel one's way, as with the hands, when one can not see.

Buckminsterto grope a little longer among the miseries and sensualities of a worldly life
1898, J. Meade Falkner, Moonfleet Chapter 4Yet there was no time to be lost if I was ever to get out alive, and so I groped with my hands against the side of the grave until I made out the bottom edge of the slab, and then fell to grubbing beneath it with my fingers. But the earth, which the day before had looked light and loamy to the eye, was stiff and hard enough when one came to tackle it with naked hands, and in an hour's time I had done little more than further weary myself and bruise my fingers.

To touch (another person) closely and (especially) sexually.We've been together two weeks, and have just been kissing and groping, but no sex yet.
(obsolete) To examine; to test; to sound.

Genevan Testament (Acts xxiv)''Felix gropeth him, thinking to have a bribe.

(plural gropes)

1866, James Edwin Thorold Rogers, A History of Agriculture and Prices in England, Volume 1, p. 544.Gropes appear to be pieces of iron binding together the inner joint of the fitting, and grope-nails to have been used for fastening these to the wood.