ask vs explain

ask

verb
  • To take (a person's situation) as an example. 

  • To interrogate or enquire of (a person). 

  • To put forward (a question) to be answered. 

  • To request or petition; usually with for. 

  • To invite. 

  • To publish in church for marriage; said of both the banns and the persons. 

  • To request permission to do something. 

  • To require, demand, claim, or expect, whether by way of remuneration or return, or as a matter of necessity. 

  • To request (information, or an answer to a question). 

noun
  • An act or instance of asking. 

  • An asking price. 

  • A message sent to a blog on social networking platform Tumblr, which can be publicly posted and replied to by the recipient. 

  • An eft; newt. 

  • A lizard. 

  • Something asked or asked for. 

explain

verb
  • To give a valid excuse for past behavior. 

  • To make plain, manifest, or intelligible; to clear of obscurity; to illustrate the meaning of. 

  • To make something plain or intelligible. 

How often have the words ask and explain occurred in a corpus of books? (source: Google Ngram Viewer )