- Letters: M/ACDEHT
- Words: 56
- Points: 232
- 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, ...) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | AC | 7 | Place of study or training |
| 1 | AC | 4 | Peak; or where Wile E. Coyote orders his supplies |
| 1 | AH | 4 | Throat-clearing, attention-getting sound |
| 1 | CA | 4 | Travel toward a particular place, tell your dog to move toward you, or slang for “to orgasm” |
| 1 | DA | 6 | Structure that holds back a river, noun/verb (beavers construct small ones) |
| 1 | DA | 4 | Title given to a woman equivalent to the rank of knight (… Olivia de Havilland) |
| 2 | DE | 4,6 | Consider (I … it a great success) |
| 1 | ED | 7 | Green soybeans boiled or steamed in their pods |
| 1 | ED | 5 | Medical term for swelling |
| 2 | EM | 5,6 | Master of Ceremonies (sounded-out initials), slang noun/verb |
| 1 | HA | 6 | Meat from a pig, often served on holidays |
| 1 | HA | 6 | Wedge-shaped carpal bone |
| 1 | HE | 6 | Turn under and sew the edge of a garment, verb/noun |
| 1 | HE | 4 | Iron-containing biological compound (in blood, e.g.) |
| 1 | MA | 7 | Stone paving material; last name of Brit surveyor John Louden |
| 2 | MA | 4,5 | Self-defense pepper spray, staff, or spice from a nutmeg |
| 1 | MA | 7 | Long knife for cutting brush |
| 1 | MA | 5 | Term of respect for a ♀, or one who runs a brothel; palindrome |
| 1 | MA | 6 | Form of address to a French-speaking woman (… Bovary) |
| 1 | MA | 7 | Indian honorific (… Gahdhi), or rice brand |
| 1 | MA | 4 | Assemble (Please … dinner tonight; I’m too tired) or force (Oh yeah? … me!), verb |
| 2 | MA | 4,5 | ♀ parent, slang |
| 1 | MA | 6 | Tangle something, especially hair, in a thick mass, verb (the present tense is too short to be a Bee word) |
| 2 | MA | 5,7 | Tennis or boxing contest, noun; or agree in color (does my tie … my shirt?), verb, past tense is a pangram |
| 1 | MA | 6 | Ground Japanese green tea leaves; also flavors sweets |
| 2 | MA | 4,5 | Fellow member (cast-…) or joint occupant (room-…) |
| 1 | MA | 4 | Addition/subtraction/multiplication/division subject abbr. |
| 1 | MA | 5 | Dull finish on paint or photos |
| 1 | ME | 4 | Alcoholic drink made from honey |
| 1 | ME | 4 | Animal flesh for consumption (beef, ham, etc.) |
| 1 | ME | 8 | Stupid person (compound, Archie Bunker's favorite name for his son-in-law) |
| 1 | ME | 5 | Holiest city in Islam, or place of attraction (shopping …) |
| 1 | ME | 4 | Encounter (I’m supposed to … him in the park) |
| 2 | ME | 4,5 | Viral internet funny image, noun/verb |
| 1 | ME | 4 | Beyond prefix, greek |
| 1 | ME | 8 | Info about a computer file (author, size, when it was created, etc.), compound noun |
| 2 | ME | 4,5 | Dispense justice (“… out punishment”), homophone of “animal flesh for consumption” |
| 1 | ME | 4 | Slang abbr. of addictive stimulant (crystal …) |
| 2 | TA | 4,5 | Not wild, adj./verb |
| 2 | TE | 4,6 | Group of sports players (Yankees, e.g.), noun; … up, verb |
| 1 | TE | 8 | A fellow player in your group, compound |
| 2 | TE | 4,6 | Be full or swarming with; homophone of Yankees group |
| 1 | TH | 4 | Pronoun for people you previously mentioned (I bathed the kids & put … to bed) |
| 2 | TH | 5,6 | Subject of a talk, or an idea that recurs in a work of art, noun (and rarely, verb - gerund is a pangram) |
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