Christopher Lee, Best Known for Horror Films

British actor Christopher Lee died last June, but I wanted to write this, as he was a big part of my childhood and teenage years, and indeed even adulthood, as his movies continued to be shown for decades after their initial releases. Further he appeared in both "Star Wars" and "Lord of the Rings" films. Throughout his long career, Christopher Lee played various roles, including Rasputin, Sherlock Holmes, Fu Manchu, and Frankenstein's monster, but to many, if not most people, he is remembered for playing Dracula in a series of films for Hammer Films, a British movie company noted for horror films. Lee did an admirable job filling the shoes of Bela Lugosi, who earlier had become THE actor associated with Dracula. So a belated farewell to Christopher Lee, whose physical presence may be gone, but whose movies continue to live on. Christopher Lee was 93.

WORD HISTORY:
Ladder-This noun, related to "lean," goes back to the Indo European root "klei," which had the notion of "lean, slope, rest at an angle." This gave its Old Germanic offspring "hlaidrizo," which meant "ladder," a device leaned against an object in order to climb upwards or downwards. This then gave Old English (Anglo-Saxon) "hlæder," with the same meaning. This later became "laddere," before the modern version. "Apparently," the Old Germanic form did not survive in the North Germanic branch, but it most certainly survived in the West Germanic branch, as besides the English form, German has "Leiter," ^ Low German Saxon has "ledder," Dutch and North Frisian have "ladder," and West Frisian has "ljedder."

^ Just a note, the German noun is grammatically feminine; thus, "die Leiter," as German has the homonym "der Leiter," which is grammatically masculine, and means "leader," and yes, it is closely related to the English word "leader."