- Letters: C/GIKNOR
- Words: 50
- Points: 261
- Pangrams: 3
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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 | CI | 5 | Cloud forming wispy streaks (“mare's tails”) at high altitude |
| 1 | CO | 5 | Spherical or nearly spherical bacterium |
| 2 | CO | 4,7 | Rooster, or slang for penis |
| 2 | CO | 6,9 | Nest for butterfly larva, noun; or wrap up like one, verb |
| 2 | CO | 4,7 | Metal $, noun; or come up with a new phrase, verb |
| 1 | CO | 4 | Fiber from the outer husk of the coconut, used for making ropes & matting |
| 1 | CO | 7 | Swindle, verb; someone serving a prison sentence (noun, slang) |
| 1 | CO | 5 | Ice cream holder shape |
| 2 | CO | 4,7 | Faint, stall, or break down (my car …ed out), verb; or hit, especially on the head, verb |
| 1 | CO | 6 | Soft murmur made by a dove or pigeon, noun/verb |
| 2 | CO | 4,7 | Prep or heat food |
| 1 | CO | 6 | The tough central part of many fruits, where the seeds are, noun; or remove that part, verb; or central, adj. |
| 1 | CO | 5 | Queen Elizabeth II’s preferred small Welsh dog breed |
| 2 | CO | 4,7 | Wine bottle stopper, originally made from the bark of certain trees, noun; or insert such a stopper, verb, gerund form is a pangram |
| 1 | CO | 4 | Veg on a cob |
| 2 | CR | 5,8 | DNA discoverer with Watson et al., or neck stiffness, noun/verb |
| 1 | CR | 8 | Bend the head and/or body in fear or in a servile manner |
| 1 | CR | 4 | Holey shoe, or alligator relative abbr. |
| 1 | CR | 5 | Slow-cooking “pot”, usually earthenware, noun; or preserve in such a pot, verb, gerund form is a pangram |
| 1 | CR | 5 | Small plant that blooms early in spring |
| 2 | CR | 5,8 | Lawbreaker, slang (Nixon: “I’m not a …”), or shepherd’s staff, noun; or bend something, especially a finger, verb, gerund form is a pangram |
| 2 | CR | 5,8 | Hum or sing in a soft, low voice, especially in a sentimental manner (think Sinatra or Bublé) |
| 1 | IC | 5 | Frozen water |
| 2 | IC | 4,6 | Symbol (you tap on phone screen, e.g.), adverb form is a pangram |
| 1 | IO | 5 | Atom or molecule with a net electric charge |
| 1 | IR | 6 | Wryly funny because it’s opposite to what’s expected (a fire station burns down, e.g,) |
| 2 | KI | 4,7 | Strike with foot, verb/noun |
| 2 | KN | 5,8 | Rap on a door, hoping to be let in, verb; or run into, verb, or disparage, slang verb/noun (…, …. Who's there?) |
| 2 | NI | 4,7 | Small cut from shaving, or Santa name (Old Saint …), noun/verb |
| 2 | NO | 4,7 | Notch at the back of an arrow, noun; or fit an arrow to a bowstring, verb |
| 1 | RI | 6 | Swamp grass which is widely cultivated as a source of food, especially in Asia, noun; or force cooked potatoes or other vegetables through a sieve, verb |
| 1 | RI | 5 | Poison from castor beans, NOT a pilaf grain |
| 1 | RI | 4 | “Casablanca” café owner”, or haystack |
| 2 | RO | 4,7 | Stone (Dwayne Johnson, with "The"); or what you do with a baby's cradle but shouldn't do with a boat, verb, gerund form is a pangram |
| 1 | RO | 6 | Ornamental decorative style from the late Baroque |
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