- Letters: Y/ACORTU
- Words: 30
- Points: 152
- Pangrams: 2
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The table provides clues for the roots of words in today's NY Times Spelling Bee. You're responsible for prefixes, suffixes,
tense changes, plurals, doubling consonants before suffixes, and alternate spellings of roots. An exception:
since Sam won't allow S, when the root contains an S, the clue may be for a plural or suffixed form. "Mice" for example.
If a clue isn't self-explanatory, try googling it.
The TL;DR about the site comes after the table.
Past clues are available here |
Today's puzzle
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Table content
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| root # | answers covered | answer's first two letters | answer's length | clue for root (answer may need prefix, suffix, tense change, alt spelling, ...) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2 | 1 | AC | 7 | Insurance risk analyst |
| 1 | 1 | AC | 8 | Correct in all details; exact |
| 5 | 1 | AR | 4 | Creative activity: painting, music, literature, dance, etc |
| 3 | 1 | AR | 5 | Ordered series, esp. math |
| 4 | 1 | AR | 6 | Steep-sided gully in SW US; Spanish for creek |
| 6 | 1 | AU | 9 | Dictator with absolute power |
| 8 | 1 | CA | 5 | Lug around (fireman’s …), verb |
| 10 | 1 | CA | 5 | Furry pet that purrs |
| 7 | 1 | CA | 7 | Orange veg that bunnies eat |
| 9 | 1 | CA | 8 | Prepared food you take home |
| 12 | 1 | CU | 5 | Dish of meat and/or vegetables, cooked in an Indian-style sauce of hot-tasting spices and typically served with rice |
| 11 | 1 | CU | 6 | The office, position or work of an assistant to a vicar or rector |
| 13 | 1 | OA | 4 | Grain that is Quaker's specialty |
| 14 | 1 | OR | 7 | Make a speech |
| 15 | 1 | OU | 6 | Strong public disapproval or anger |
| 16 | 1 | RA | 4 | Lively, entertaining, & mildly sexual; adj. (think car or horse speed contest) |
| 17 | 1 | RA | 5 | Sewer-dwelling rodent |
| 18 | 1 | RO | 6 | Phone with dial, adj., or int’l service org (… Club) |
| 19 | 1 | RO | 8 | Move in a circle around an axis or center |
| 20 | 1 | RU | 5 | Long deep track made by the repeated passage of the wheels of vehicles |
| 21 | 1 | TA | 5 | Dark, thick, flammable liquid distilled from wood or coal |
| 22 | 1 | TA | 5 | Worn & shabby, or of poor quality; Scottish |
| 23 | 1 | TR | 4 | Use it to carry drinks |
| 24 | 1 | TR | 4 | Helen of “The Iliad” home, or oz. for gold & gems |
| 25 | 1 | TR | 6 | Audition, test for someone hoping to join a team |
| 26 | 1 | TY | 4 | Newbie, from Latin “recruit” |
| 27 | 1 | YO | 4 | Second person possessive adjective |
| 28 | 1 | YU | 4 | Cassava |
| 30 | 1 | YU | 4 | Circular tent of felt or skins |
| 29 | 1 | YU | 5 | Agave with stiff sword-like leaves and spikes of white bell-shaped flowers |
This site provides clues for a day's New York Times Spelling Bee puzzle. It exists to make it easier for Kevin Davis to take a day off. Most of the clues come from him. There may be some startup problems, but long term I think I can put the clues together with no more than half an hour's work.
The "Bee Roots" approach is to provide explicit clues for root words, not every word. This is similar to what Kevin Davis does, but without information about parts of speech As logophiles, we are pretty good at putting on prefixes and suffixes, changing tense, and forming plurals (including Latin plurals!). The clues cover root words, arranged alphabetically by root word, with a count of words in the puzzle that come from each root. For example, if a puzzle includes ROAM and ROAMING, there will be a clue for ROAM and a count of 2. The root may not appear in the puzzle at all; for example, the 2021-07-23 Bee included ICED, DEICE, and DEICED. For such a puzzle, the clue would be for ICE with a word count of 3.
The Bee Roots approach involves judgement sometimes. For example, if a puzzle includes LOVE, LOVED, and LOVELY, how many roots are needed to cover them? LOVE and LOVED share the root LOVE, certainly, but LOVELY is tricky. LOVE is part of its etymology, but by now, the word means "exquisitely beautiful," which is a lot farther from the meaning of LOVE than swithcing to past tense. I'm inclined to treat LOVE and LOVELY as separate roots. You may not agree, which is fine. Another thing we logophiles share is a LOVE of arguing about words on Twitter.
One last complication, until another one pops up: a few roots have multiple spellings, for example LOLLYGAG and LALLYGAG. Depending on the day's letters, and maybe even the editor's whims, one or both could be in the puzzle's answer list. With such roots, you could see a word count of 2, even if there are no applicable prefixes or suffixes.
I will do my best to keep this site up to date and helpful (I hope). Check it out, and tweet feedback to @donswartwout Tweet to @donswartwout
Many thanks to Kevin Davis, whose 4,500-word clue list made this possible.