- Letters: P/AGINRW
- Words: 45
- Points: 244
- 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 letter | answer's length | clue for root (answer may need prefix, suffix, tense change, alt spelling, ...) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | A | 5 | Large primate without a tail, including gorilla, chimpanzees, and orangutans, noun/verb |
| 1 | A | 5 | Bee-related adj. |
| 1 | G | 6 | Stare open-mouthed |
| 2 | G | 4,7 | British slang version of gawk or gape |
| 1 | G | 6 | Strong Italian brandy |
| 2 | G | 4,8 | Grasp tightly, verb/noun |
| 1 | G | 7 | Complain about something in a persistent, irritating way |
| 1 | N | 7 | Brief period of sleep during the day |
| 1 | N | 7 | Pinch, squeeze, or bite sharply, verb/noun |
| 1 | P | 5 | Heathen; worshiper of the old gods (… rituals) |
| 1 | P | 6 | Book leaf, noun; or summon with a beeper or announcement, verb |
| 2 | P | 4,7 | Sensation from an injury, noun/verb |
| 2 | P | 4,7 | Twosome (socks, aces, e.g.) |
| 1 | P | 7 | Something you cook food in, noun; try to find gold in a stream, verb; something a critic loves to do, verb |
| 1 | P | 4 | Stab of emotion (… of guilt or regret) |
| 1 | P | 6 | Toasted Italian sandwich |
| 1 | P | 4 | Father, slang |
| 1 | P | 6 | Trim off the outside or the ends, verb, NOT easily bruised fruit or group of two; or reduce as if by trimming (city council had to … down the budget) |
| 1 | P | 6 | Animal foot with claws and pads, noun/verb |
| 2 | P | 4,7 | Give something valuable as security for a loan, verb; or the most-numerous chess piece |
| 2 | P | 5,6 | Another name for papaya (2 spellings) |
| 1 | P | 7 | Animal that is the source of bacon, noun/verb |
| 1 | P | 7 | Thin piece of metal with a sharp point at one end, used especially for securing fabric, noun/verb |
| 1 | P | 6 | Evergreen tree with cones, noun; or to long for, verb |
| 2 | P | 4,7 | Query a computer to determine connection speed; or get a sonar hit; or first word of informal name for table tennis |
| 1 | P | 6 | Copper or plastic tube that carries water, noun; or to move liquid in one, verb; decorate a cake with icing |
| 1 | P | 6 | Fosse musical about Charlemagne’s son, or apple variety |
| 1 | P | 5 | Edible decapod crustacean that looks like a shrimp, but bigger |
| 1 | P | 4 | Self-righteously moralistic person |
| 1 | R | 7 | Quick, sharp knock or blow, noun/verb, NOT cover a gift in colorful paper; or music genre featuring words recited rapidly and rhythmically over a prerecorded, typically electronic instrumental backing, noun/verb |
| 1 | R | 6 | Broccoli rabe |
| 1 | R | 7 | Tear or pull something quickly or forcibly, verb/noun |
| 1 | R | 8 | (Legal) relating to or situated on the banks of a river |
| 2 | W | 4,7 | Become bent or twisted out of shape, often because of heat or dampness, verb; or the non-weft threads in weaving, noun |
| 1 | W | 6 | Clean or dry something by rubbing it with a cloth, a piece of paper, or a hand, verb; or a pre-moistened cleaning cloth, noun |
| 2 | W | 4,8 | Cover with paper or soft material, noun/verb (I still have to … the Christmas presents) |
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