- Letters: O/AGLNPY
- Words: 70
- Points: 297
- 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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| answers covered | answer's first two letters | answer's length | clue for root (answer may need prefix, suffix, tense change, alt spelling, ...) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | AG | 4 | Very excited to hear or see something, adj. |
| 1 | AG | 5 | Extreme pain |
| 1 | AL | 5 | Two or more metals combined to make a new one, (brass, steel, etc.); noun/verb |
| 1 | AL | 5 | Down or next to (… the road), during (… the way), or with (brought …), preposition or adv. |
| 1 | AN | 6 | Clock with hands; not digital; adj. |
| 1 | AN | 7 | Comparison (life is like a box of chocolates) |
| 1 | AN | 5 | Irritate, vex, irk |
| 1 | AN | 4 | Soon, poetically |
| 1 | AP | 7 | Acknowledgement of regret (I owe him an … for my insult), negated form is a pangram |
| 1 | GA | 6 | 128 liquid oz. |
| 1 | GA | 6 | Horse's top speed |
| 1 | GA | 5 | Lively ballroom dance, popular in the 19th century, named after a horse's top speed |
| 4 | GL | 4,5,6,6 | Sticky and amorphous substance, typically something unpleasant (2 spellings) |
| 1 | GO | 4 | Objective, or sport target or point |
| 1 | GO | 6 | Eye protector for swimming or skiing; or stare with wide & bulging eyes |
| 1 | GO | 5 | Informal exclamation of surprise (part of Little Richard song title “Good …, Miss M...”) |
| 1 | GO | 4 | Orchestra chime or dinner bell |
| 1 | GO | 5 | Intend to do, slang contraction |
| 1 | GO | 6 | Unfocused or rolling eyes, adj.; or cricket bowling variation |
| 1 | GO | 6 | Large number (10¹⁰⁰), NOT a web search site |
| 1 | GO | 4 | Ruffian |
| 1 | GO | 5 | Black-footed albatross |
| 2 | GO | 4,5 | Gwyneth Paltrow’s brand, or unpleasant messy gel |
| 1 | LA | 6 | Inlet separated by a reef; “Blue …” film with Brooke Shields |
| 1 | LL | 5 | South American grassy plain |
| 1 | LO | 4 | Borrowed $, noun/verb |
| 1 | LO | 4 | Company graphic symbol; Target’s is a red bullseye ◎ |
| 1 | LO | 4 | Sluggish, adj., or “study of” suffix |
| 1 | LO | 4 | Hang out or droop, as a dog’s tongue |
| 1 | LO | 6 | Move in an ungainly way in a series of clumsy paces or bounds |
| 1 | LO | 8 | Dawdle, slang (ends in “mouth covering” synonym) |
| 1 | LO | 4 | “Short” antonym, adj.; or yearn (for) |
| 1 | LO | 6 | Tropical Asian fruit similar to lychee |
| 2 | LO | 4,5 | “Crazy” water bird on Canada $1 coin |
| 2 | LO | 4,5 | Closed curve |
| 2 | LO | 5,7 | Faithful, devoted |
| 1 | NO | 10 | Acknowledgement of regret (I owe him an … for my insult), negated form is a pangram |
| 2 | NO | 7,9 | 9–sided shape |
| 1 | NO | 4 | 12:00, midday, 🕛 |
| 1 | NY | 5 | Synthetic stocking fabric |
| 1 | ON | 5 | Pre-molded tooth restoration that covers chewing surface |
| 1 | ON | 4 | Sole, nothing more (“I’m … human!”) |
| 1 | OO | 6 | Dark Chinese tea (black dragon) |
| 1 | OP | 4 | Gemstone from Australia, October birthstone |
| 1 | PA | 7 | Splendid display; complete or impressive collection of things |
| 1 | PA | 6 | Bribe paid to a radio DJ to air a particular song |
| 1 | PL | 4 | Sound of Alka–Seltzer before the fizz |
| 1 | PL | 4 | Cunning ruse |
| 1 | PO | 4 | Bouncy “stick”, noun/verb |
| 1 | PO | 4 | Opinion survey, homophone of above (straw, Gallup, e.g.) |
| 1 | PO | 4 | Croquet on horseback |
| 2 | PO | 7,9 | Geometric figure with an unspecified number of sides, adj. form is a pangram |
| 1 | PO | 5 | Small growth on a stalk (in your colon, e.g.) |
| 1 | PO | 4 | Early Atari table tennis game |
| 1 | PO | 4 | Yankee Doodle went riding into town on this small horse breed |
| 1 | PO | 4 | Swimming venue |
| 1 | PO | 4 | Tire out (I’m …ed); or defecate, slang verb/noun |
| 1 | PO | 5 | Daddy |
| 1 | PO | 5 | Flower used to make opium or honor veterans |
| 1 | PY | 5 | Traffic cone or endzone marker |
| 1 | YO | 4 | Bendy, meditative exercise on mats |
This site provides clues for a day's New York Times Spelling Bee puzzle. It follows in Kevin Davis' footsteps. The original set of 4,500 clues came from him, and they still make up about three quarters of the current clue set.
The "Bee Roots" approach is to provide explicit clues for root words, not every word. 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.
A few words can have one meaning as a suffixed form and another as a stand-alone word. EVENING, for example. In those cases I will use the meaning that I think is more common.
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