Spelling Test Questions and Answers

Answer: C

Correct answer: Bouquet

The correct spelling is bouquet, keeping the French ou and the silent t. It comes from the French for a little wood or thicket, a diminutive of bois, and English took it whole in the eighteenth century without anglicising the spelling. The final t is not pronounced, which is why it is so often dropped in writing. A whole family of French borrowings ends in a silent -et or -ot and gives the same trouble: ballet, buffet, chalet, gourmet, sachet, ricochet, depot and debut. The word has a second sense worth knowing, since it appears in comprehension passages: the characteristic smell of a wine. Other French borrowings that keep an unexpected spelling include liaison, rendezvous, connoisseur and questionnaire.

Answer: D

Correct answer: Ecstasy

The correct spelling is ecstasy, ending in -asy with an s, not -acy with a c. The -acy ending is far commoner - democracy, privacy, literacy, accuracy, diplomacy - which is why ecstacy looks right. Only a small group ends in -asy: ecstasy, fantasy, idiosyncrasy, apostasy and hypocrisy, the last with an i. The word comes from the Greek ekstasis, a standing outside oneself, from ek, out, and histanai, to stand - and the Greek s is what survives in the ending. The cs spelling of the ks sound preserves the same Greek origin, which is why extasy is wrong. The adjective is ecstatic, where the s is plainly heard.

Answer: B

Correct answer: Existence

The correct spelling is existence, ending in -ence and with no s after the x. The x already supplies the ks sound, so adding an s after it doubles a sound that is written once. The same holds for excellent, exhilarate and exaggerate. The -ence against -ance choice has no general rule and must be learned word by word, though there is a partial guide: verbs ending in -ist and -ere usually give -ence. So exist gives existence, persist gives persistence, insist gives insistence, and interfere gives interference. Against them stand maintain giving maintenance, appear giving appearance, and resist giving resistance - which breaks the pattern and shows why memory is safer than rules here.

Answer: A

Correct answer: Bookkeeper

The correct spelling is bookkeeper, and it is celebrated for containing three consecutive doubled letters - oo, kk, ee. It is the only common English word to do so, along with its relative bookkeeping. The double k is the feature that looks wrong and is therefore most often reduced. It arises simply from the compound: book plus keeper, each keeping all its own letters. English compounds do not drop a letter at the join, which is why withhold has two hs and misspell two ses. The contrast is with threshold, which looks like a compound of thresh and hold but is not, and so has only one h. A bookkeeper records financial transactions, a narrower function than an accountant, who interprets and reports on them.

Answer: D

Correct answer: Maintenance

The correct spelling is maintenance - note that the ai of the verb maintain does not survive into the noun. That change trips almost everybody: one maintains a road, but pays for its maintenance, with an e in the middle syllable. The word came into English through the Old French maintenir, and the noun kept the French vowel while the verb did not. The ending is -ance, not -ence, which must simply be learned; there is no rule that decides between the two. A group of nouns changes its vowel from the related verb in the same way and is worth learning together: pronounce gives pronunciation, explain gives explanation, repeat gives repetition, exclaim gives exclamation, and curious gives curiosity.

Answer: A

Correct answer: Accommodation

The correct spelling is accommodation, with a double c and a double m. It is among the most misspelt words in English, and dropping one of the ms is the usual error. The mnemonic is that accommodation has room for two cots and two mattresses. The double c comes from the Latin prefix ad- assimilating before c, and the double m from commodus, convenient - the same root as commodity and commodious. The verb is accommodate, and the participle accommodating, both keeping the four consonants. It belongs with the other double-double words that are regularly reduced: embarrass, possession, assassination, millennium and committee.

Answer: B

Correct answer: Sovereign

The correct spelling is sovereign - e before i, with a silent g. The g is a historical accident. The word came from the Old French soverain and had no g at all; sixteenth-century scribes inserted one by false analogy with reign, supposing a connection with the Latin regnum that does not exist. The word actually derives from super, above. Foreign acquired its silent g in exactly the same way, and the two are worth learning as a pair, since both also break the i before e rule. The -eign ending is confined to a small group: sovereign, foreign, reign, feign and deign. The noun is sovereignty, which keeps every letter and adds a further syllable.

Answer: B

It is surveillance.

From the French surveiller, to watch over. The eill is French, and the ending is -ance.

Answer: A

Correct answer: Hierarchy

The correct spelling is hierarchy - hie- at the start, not hei-. The transposition to heirarchy is the commonest error, driven by the familiar English word heir, which is unrelated. The word is Greek, from hieros, sacred, and archein, to rule - originally the ranked orders of angels or of priests, and only later any ranked system. The same hier- appears in hieroglyph, sacred carving, which is a useful cross-check. The -archy ending, meaning rule, belongs to a family worth knowing: monarchy is rule by one, anarchy is rule by none, oligarchy by a few, matriarchy and patriarchy by mothers and fathers. The ch is pronounced as k throughout the group, which is the regular English treatment of the Greek letter chi, as in chorus, character and architect.

Answer: C

Correct answer: Asphyxiation

The correct spelling is asphyxiation - with a y rather than an i in the third syllable, and the full ending -iation. It is Greek, from a-, without, and sphyxis, a pulse - so the word originally meant a stopping of the pulse rather than of the breath, and the modern sense of suffocation came later. The y is the standard English rendering of the Greek letter upsilon, and it marks a large class of borrowings: physics, psychology, syntax, system, symbol, hypothesis, oxygen and myth. Where a word looks Greek, the vowel is usually y. The ph for an f sound is the same signal, rendering the Greek phi. The verb is asphyxiate and the noun for the condition itself is asphyxia, without the -tion.