- Letters: I/AEHLNT
- Words: 69
- Points: 315
- Pangrams: 1
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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, ...) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2 | AL | 5,8 | Extraterrestrial (“In space no one can hear you scream”) |
| 1 | AL | 4 | Illumination, noun/verb (Let there be …) |
| 1 | AN | 10 | Utterly destroy, obliterate, pangram, and so is its gerund form |
| 1 | AN | 7 | Mound made by industrious six-legged creatures |
| 1 | AN | 4 | Opposed to (prefix), NOT uncle’s wife's nickname |
| 1 | AT | 6 | Succeed in getting, or reach; verb (… nirvana) |
| 1 | AT | 5 | Move into a sloping position, or fight windmills (… at) |
| 1 | EL | 5 | Select group that’s superior |
| 1 | EN | 6 | Involve something as a necessary consequence: "the job …s a lot of hard work" |
| 1 | EN | 7 | Name of a book, movie, or job, noun/verb; or a document showing you own a car or house |
| 1 | HA | 4 | Frozen rain “stone,” noun; or summon a taxi, verb |
| 1 | HA | 6 | Rock salt |
| 1 | HE | 6 | A person’s buttocks, slang |
| 1 | HI | 6 | Hernia type where tummy pokes through diaphragm |
| 1 | HI | 4 | What Jack & Jill went up |
| 1 | HI | 4 | Sword or dagger handle |
| 1 | HI | 4 | Clue, suggestion, noun/verb |
| 1 | IN | 5 | Stupid, silly, ridiculous (… questions or comments); adj. |
| 2 | IN | 6,8 | The phase of breathing that expands your chest |
| 1 | IN | 7 | First (letter, as in J.R.R. Tolkien), verb form is a pangram |
| 1 | IN | 8 | Cause to begin, or admit into a secret society; verb; or novice, noun |
| 1 | IN | 6 | Present from birth (… behavior), adj. |
| 1 | IN | 5 | Concave belly button, slang |
| 1 | IN | 5 | Computer chip maker; or what spies collect, abbr. |
| 1 | IN | 6 | Determined to do (I’m … on finishing this puzzle), adj.; or objective, noun |
| 1 | IN | 5 | Allow; rent |
| 1 | LA | 5 | Hawaiian porch or island |
| 1 | LA | 4 | Put something down |
| 1 | LE | 7 | Merciful, not strict (as a judge or parent, e.g.) |
| 1 | LE | 6 | Bean for soup or curry |
| 1 | LI | 4 | Bank hold on a mortgaged property, NOT tilt |
| 1 | LI | 4 | Singsong accent |
| 2 | LI | 4,6 | A queue, what you wait in for your turn |
| 1 | LI | 5 | Cloth napkin fabric |
| 1 | LI | 6 | Mainly brown & gray finch with a reddish breast & forehead (rhymes with the type of piano I have) |
| 1 | LI | 4 | Dryer fluff |
| 1 | LI | 6 | Horiz. beam across a door or window top |
| 1 | LI | 4 | Low-calorie or low-fat in ad-speak (Miller … beer) |
| 1 | LI | 5 | Skinny, supple, & graceful (her … figure) |
| 1 | LI | 6 | Small (Stuart or Chicken …), adj. |
| 1 | NA | 4 | Spike that’s hammered, noun/verb |
| 2 | NI | 4,5 | Number of justices on Supreme Court |
| 2 | NI | 8,10 | One more than the number of holes on a golf course |
| 1 | NI | 9 | XC in Roman numerals |
| 1 | NI | 4 | Part of the day when it’s dark, slang spelling |
| 1 | TA | 6 | Middle Eastern sesame seed paste or sauce |
| 1 | TA | 4 | Dogs wag this hind appendage |
| 1 | TA | 5 | Smear of corruption or pollution, noun/verb |
| 1 | TA | 6 | Fringed prayer shawl |
| 1 | TA | 4 | Ankle bone |
| 1 | TA | 6 | Brown chemical in tea & wine used to preserve leather, noun |
| 1 | TH | 4 | Skinny, adj. (… Mints) |
| 1 | TH | 5 | Yours, archaic singular |
| 1 | TI | 4 | Thin ceramic wall, counter, flooring, or roofing square |
| 1 | TI | 4 | Cash register or drawer, noun; “up to,” preposition; or prep soil for planting, verb |
| 1 | TI | 4 | Move into a sloping position, or fight windmills (… at) |
| 1 | TI | 5 | Cultivation of land, or prepped soil surface, noun; rhymes with “extreme dirt” synonym |
| 1 | TI | 4 | Fork prong |
| 1 | TI | 4 | Shade of color, noun; or darken car windows, verb |
| 1 | TI | 5 | Pre-Olympic god, largest Saturn moon, or industry bigwig |
| 1 | TI | 5 | Give 10% of your income to the Church |
| 1 | TI | 9 | Stimulate or excite, especially in a sexual way |
| 1 | TI | 5 | Name of a book, movie, or job, noun/verb; or a document showing you own a car or house |
| 1 | TI | 6 | Dot above an i or j, or really small amount |
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