The Daily News Of Open Water Swimming

To educate, entertain, and enthuse all those who venture beyond the shoreline
World Open Water Swimming Federation, a human-powered project

Random News

Does The Fear Of Stings Comes From The Open Water World?

Spread the love

LoneSwimmer provided a list of phobias that are relevant to the open water swimming world here.

Donal Buckley describes Cnidophobia as a fear of stings…[whereas] surprisingly there is no specific clinical phobia for jellyfish.

Upon further research, it appears there may be a linguistic connection of this phobia to jellyfish.

Although Cnidophobia is a morbid fear of being stung by a bee or wasp, its etymology comes from the New Latin Cndria, a phylum name, from Greek sea nettle + from the Greek φόβος, phóbos or fear. Where cnidarian is any invertebrate animal, as a hydra, jellyfish, sea anemone, or coral, considered as belonging to the phylum Cnidaria, characterized by the specialized stinging structures in the tentacles surrounding the mouth.

So while modern usage of Cnidophobia strictly refers to stings by a bee or wasp, it appears our linguistic predecessors knew all about stings from jellyfish.

Copyright © 2012 by Open Water Source

Leave a Comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Scroll to Top