Compound Words

Starfish isn't the answer, sadly.

Think of two words such that when you place the words back to back, it creates a new word that doesn’t sound like saying the two words in succession. Note that traditional compound words are pronounced exactly the same as saying the composing words in succession. For instance, starfish sounds like saying star and then fish. You can think of the answer as a “non-traditional compound word”.

There are many possible solutions, so once you find one, try to figure out some of the spinoffs below!

  1. New word doesn’t contain the sound of either of the two words
  2. New word gains syllables
  3. New word loses syllables
  4. New word doesn’t contain the sound of either of the two words and loses syllables
  5. The word that contains two different pairs of words that are back to back
  6. The word contains a trio of words
  7. The word contains two different trios of words.

Only look at the solutions once you have give up, because you can figure this one out!

Solutions:

Note that there are many possible solutions, these are just a few that we like.

Classic puzzle answers, a few:

  • father (fat + her)
  • partying (par + tying)

Spinoffs:

  1. New word doesn’t contain the sound of either of the two words
    • island (is + land)
  2. New word gains syllables
    • moderate (mode + rate)
  3. New word loses syllables
    • brain (bra + in)
    • throbbed (throb + bed)
  4. New word is three letters:
    • ahi (a + hi)
    • are (a + re), re is a vague word, so not a huge fan of this one
  5. New word doesn’t contain the sound of either of the two words and loses syllables
    • spared (spa + red)
  6. New word contains two different pairs of words
    • assail (as + sail, ass + ail
    • atone (at + one, a + tone)
  7. New word contains a trio of words
    • compression (compress + i + on)
  8. New word contains two different trios of words.
    • attraction (attract + i + on, at + tract + ion)