- Letters: D/ACGINR
- Words: 61
- Points: 330
- 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, ...) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2 | AC | 4,6 | Below 7 on the pH scale (amino …, sulfuric …, hydrochloric …) |
| 1 | AC | 5 | Strong & unpleasant taste or smell, adj. |
| 1 | AD | 6 | Join something to something else |
| 1 | AI | 6 | Help |
| 2 | AR | 7,8 | Region or scene of simple pleasure or quiet, city near LA, or mountainous southern region of Greece |
| 1 | AR | 4 | Dry (climate or land), adj. |
| 1 | CA | 7 | Get something without paying for it (slang) |
| 1 | CA | 6 | Unfounded rumor (that old…), or plane forewing |
| 1 | CA | 6 | Unposed photo, or frank; adj. (Smile! You’re on “… Camera”) |
| 1 | CA | 5 | Member of the dog family, noun |
| 2 | CA | 4,7 | Thing used to play poker & bridge, noun; or ask for ID as proof of age before entry, verbified noun |
| 1 | CA | 7 | Heart, medical adj. (… arrest) |
| 1 | CA | 8 | Button-down sweater, pangram |
| 1 | CI | 6 | Noisy 17–year insect |
| 1 | CI | 9 | 24–hour body rhythm, physiology adj. |
| 1 | DA | 7 | Move rhythmically to music, verb/noun |
| 1 | DA | 4 | Mild cuss (just get the … thing working!); euphemism for “condemn to Hell” expletive |
| 1 | DA | 6 | Have the courage to do something risky; or challenge someone to do something risky, verb/noun |
| 2 | DA | 4,7 | Mild exclamation; or mend holes in socks, verb |
| 1 | DI | 6 | Spotted cubes you roll, noun; or chop into cubes, verb |
| 1 | DI | 7 | Make a hole in the ground; enjoy (slang) |
| 1 | DI | 5 | Arab $, not supper |
| 1 | DI | 6 | Eat at a restaurant |
| 2 | DI | 4,7 | Dent (a … on the car door), or 1st ½ of doorbell sound |
| 2 | DR | 4,8 | Pull roughly, or pass time slowly & tediously, verb + adj. |
| 2 | DR | 5,8 | What sink water goes down |
| 1 | GA | 7 | go around from one place to another, in the pursuit of pleasure or entertainment |
| 2 | GI | 4,7 | Encircle with a belt |
| 1 | GR | 4 | Alumnus, abbr. |
| 1 | GR | 7 | Level of rank, quality, proficiency, intensity, or value; or a mark summarizing a student's performance, noun/verb |
| 1 | GR | 5 | Magnificent or imposing in appearance, size, or style, adj.; a thousand $, slang |
| 2 | GR | 7,8 | Your parent's father (familiar) |
| 1 | GR | 4 | Network of lines that cross each other to form a series of squares or rectangles (@the…kid) |
| 2 | GR | 5,8 | Crush something into fine particles or powder, verb; or long, hard work, noun (the daily …) |
| 1 | IN | 6 | Subspecies of cannabis plant |
| 1 | IN | 7 | Bulk-mail postage stamp substitute, or other distinguishing mark |
| 1 | NA | 4 | Nothing, Spanish |
| 1 | NA | 5 | Lowest point, rock-bottom, depths; or below the observer in astronomy |
| 1 | NA | 5 | Greek water nymph, or dragonfly larva |
| 1 | RA | 5 | Nickname of Cpl. O’Reilly in M.A.S.H., or Doppler weather sensor acronym |
| 1 | RA | 6 | Unit of angular measure of a ○ |
| 1 | RA | 5 | Distance from a point on a circle to the center |
| 2 | RA | 4,7 | Sudden attack, as in “air” or police;” or insect spray |
| 1 | RA | 6 | Adj. for food with oil or fat that smells off |
| 1 | RA | 4 | Kirk’s Yeoman Janice on Star Trek, or South African $ |
| 1 | RI | 7 | Make free of something unwanted or troublesome (get … of that spoiled food) |
| 1 | RI | 6 | Sit on and control the movement of an animal, especially a horse; or travel in a car driven by someone else, verb |
| 1 | RI | 7 | Long narrow hilltop, noun; or form into narrow raised bands, verb |
| 1 | RI | 5 | Not flexible |
| 1 | RI | 4 | Tough outer skin of certain fruit, especially citrus |
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.
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