The Arabic alphabet is the third of our alphabet series, and is the least kind to Scrabble players. 

 

Many of the words are not allowed in Scrabble, and those that are have other, more everyday meanings.

 

Here is the alphabet - those marked with an * are NOT allowed in Scrabble.

 

'Alif    * (because of the apostrophe)  (but ALIF is acceptable)

Ba

Ta

Tha   *

Jim    *

Ha

Kha    *

Dal

Dhal

Ra      *

Zain    *

Sin

Shin

Sad

Dad

Ta

Za

'Ain      * (because of the apostrophe)  (but AIN is acceptable)

Ghain    *

Fa

Qaf       *

Kaf

Lam    

Mim

Nun

Ha

Waw

 

Ya

The second set in our alphabet series is the letters of the Greek Alphabet.

Many of these letters appear in scientific terms so should be well known to mathematicians and physicists !

 

ALL words listed below are valid in Scrabble.

Alpha 

Beta

Gamma

Delta

Epsilon

Zeta

Eta

Theta

Iota

Kappa

Lambda

Mu

Nu

Xi

Omicron

Pi

Rho

Sigma

Tau

Upsilon

Phi

Chi

Psi

 

Omega

Earlier this year we published a series of articles showing different ways to learn words.

 

Another method is to take a discrete set of words and learn them. This month we will publish 4 discrete alphabet sets for you to learn.

Many of the 'letters' are fairly well known, but there may be a gem or two for you to unearth! In future we will study the Hebrew, Arabic and Greek alphabets.

 

Firstly the NATO phonetic alphabet. 

Here all the words represent a letter from the English language. A couple of the letters have variant spellings this is to help non-English speakers pronounce the word correctly. (For example, the French would typically pronounce 'Juliet' as "Julie-AY" but will pronounce the final 't' sound when a second 't' is added to the end of the word)

Unless otherwise stated ALL words listed below are valid in Scrabble.

Alpha or Alfa 

Bravo

Charlie

Delta

Echo

Foxtrot

Golf

Hotel

India

Juliet or Juliett (JULIET is valid, JULIETT is not)

Kilo

Lima

Mike

November

Oscar

Papa

Quebec

Romeo

Sierra

Tango

Uniform

Victor

Whiskey

X-ray or Xray  (XRAY is valid, X-RAY is not)

Yankee

 

Zulu

Our apologies.

 

Since our last puzzle, "ITS HOT" based on the hot weather we were experiencing then, Summer seems to have disappeared. We clearly jinxed it. Sorry.

So as a valiant attempt to bring it back again....

 

What are the 7 letter words you can make with ITSWET and a blank ?

 

There are quite a few. A reasonable number to find would be between 5 and 10, but there are a few obscure ones too...

Answers below.

 

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With an A,  ITSWET makes TAWIEST, TWAITES

With a D you can make DEWITTS and TWISTED

With an E, WETTIES.

 

With an H you can make TEWHITS, WETTISH, WHITEST

With a N ENTWIST and TWINSET

With an O, TOWIEST.

 

With an R, RETWIST, TWISTER, WITTERS

and with a U - WETSUIT.

15 words in all. Well done if you got more than 10.

 

 

From time to time you may find your rack contains rather a lot of consonants, and you may need to play a few of them off to keep a balanced rack. This is relatively straightforward if you have a 'Y' on the rack (hint : that's the next quiz). But what if you have no Y ?

 

So what are the three letter words containing no vowels or Y ? Answers below. (A small hint, two of them require a blank).

 

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BRR

CWM

GRR

HMM

MMM

NTH

PHT

PST

PWN

SHH

TSK

TWP

 

ZZZ