Word Droppin11- Coulrophobia

Word dropping11

Coulrophobia

An Australian genealogist Victor and I became friends, trying to find out something about John Lang together. Lang was an Australian lawyer-writer who spent a large part of his life in India in the 19th century, and even fought Rani of Jhansi’s case against the East India Company. I did not know till I met Victor that “genealogist’ could be a profession.
“Well,” said Victor, when a friend and I met him for the first time, “the genealogy of the word genealogy is that it’s got a Greek genealogy. ‘Logos’ as you know is student, and ‘genus’ means generation. In a young country like Australia, everyone wants routes to their roots.”
We were at the Camel’s Back Cemetry in Mussoorie where Lang’s grave is. My friend trying to match the genealogist’s poetic penchant, said, “This cemetery has a lot of symmetry. Everything is so neatly laid out.”
Victor replied, “Not all cemetries are symmetrical my friend. And in some places, deliberately so. Some communities have been afraid of symmetry. It is called symmetrophobia.”
“That’s quite funny,” my friend said, “I have never heard of something like this. The best architecture is symmetrical, the best looking faces are the most symmetrical ones.”
“You need to learn a little more my friend,” Victor said, “ have you read Lindsay Jones’s The Hermeneutics Of Sacred Architecture: A Reassessment Of The Similitude Between Tula, Hidalgo And Chichen Itza? The Egyptian and Japanese deliberately keep their buildings assymetrical.”
I realised that we were entering into a dangerous territory and butted in, “We are at the grave but do we need to be so grave?”
Victor’s eyes suddenly lit up, “Do you know why the two ‘graves’ you used in your sentence have different meanings?”
“Well they have almost the same meaning,” I said, “both are depressing.”
“No,” said Victor, “the noun ‘grave’ where people sleep the longest slumber comes from Germanic and Gothic graban which means a ditch, whereas the adjective ‘grave’ for sombre expression comes from Latin ‘gravis’ which means, weighty and serious.”
“Your point has got quite some gravity,” I tried to be innovative.
“But you’ll realize the irony when you know that a similar sounding ‘gravid’ means preganat, because it comes from the Latin root. Grave and gravid, and vividly different meanings,” Victor said.
My friend was looking flummoxed and said, “Let’s go, or else the dead will turn in their graves. We will resurrect them with our chatter.”
“I am no resurrectionist,” said Victor and started laughing.
“Why are you laughing,” friend asked.
“Oh because it reminded me of Charlie Chaplin,” the Austrlian chuckled.
“Resurrection and Chaplin?” I asked
“Well, resurrectionist is a euphemism for grave robbers, and Charlie Chaplin’s grave was robbed. A couple of people kidnapped his dead body in hope of a ransom,” Victor said.
“Quite funny,” friend said, “they were bigger clowns than Chaplin. I’d rather stay away from such clowns.”
“Oh you have coulrophobia. You are afraid of clowns,” Victor said.
“Yes,” said the friend, and ran off pointing towards him.