Beware the wooden hill. So many words for phobias have been created that I sometimes wonder how anybody can get through the day without suffering an adverse reaction to some aspect of life. While many of these terms are facetious and badly formed, I recently came across one for a real condition with a proper classical etymology: bathmophobia. It’s not a fear of immersive ablutions but of stairs. It’s from Greek bathmos, a step or threshold. Related is climacophobia, a fear of climbing stairs (a subtle but significant difference), which is from Greek klimax, a ladder or highest point, from which our climax directly derives.
Posted on: Mon, 22 Sep 2014 04:05:43 +0000
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