Loving Linguistics

Are you afraid of love? A phobia is a persistent, abnormal, and irrational fear of a specific thing or situation that compels one to avoid it, despite the awareness and reassurance that it is not dangerous. The word phobia is Greek often used as a suffix, -phobia, and is coupled with another Greek or Latin rout to produce a word with the meaning “fear of…” For example, triskaidekaphobia means “fear of the number 13.” This edition’s puzzle is a crossword of ‘Valentine’ Phobias.