# how good is your spelling?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-good-is-your-spelling/277772
**Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
**Created:** [December 2, 2004, 9:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-good-is-your-spelling/277772 "2004-12-02T21:35:15Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@InvidiousCourgette](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/InvidiousCourgette)
#### Post date: [December 2, 2004, 9:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-good-is-your-spelling/277772/1 "2004-12-02T21:35:15Z")
mine is only ok. 6/10
tell me how you do…
[http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/4059953.stm](http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/4059953.stm)
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### Author:  [@Lobsang](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobsang)
#### Post date: [December 2, 2004, 9:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-good-is-your-spelling/277772/2 "2004-12-02T21:42:19Z")
6/10
All my errors look like grammatical anomalies. (they don’t look like how you’d expect them to be spelled)
BTW this is RICH coming from BBC news online.
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### Author:  [@twickster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/twickster)
#### Post date: [December 2, 2004, 9:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-good-is-your-spelling/277772/3 "2004-12-02T21:42:20Z")
9/10. OTOH, I already knew I don’t know how to spell accommodate. (That second “m” just looks wrong to me.)
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### Author:  [@tremorviolet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tremorviolet)
#### Post date: [December 2, 2004, 9:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-good-is-your-spelling/277772/4 "2004-12-02T21:43:13Z")
Hmph, I missed two. And one of the one’s I missed, MerriamWebster has my chosen spelling as a variant so it’s really only one. 🙂
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### Author:  [@FilmGeek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FilmGeek)
#### Post date: [December 2, 2004, 9:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-good-is-your-spelling/277772/5 "2004-12-02T21:44:13Z")
Supersede and supercede are both right.
So are miniscule and minuscule.
So. I reject this test.
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### Author:  [@InvidiousCourgette](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/InvidiousCourgette)
#### Post date: [December 2, 2004, 9:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-good-is-your-spelling/277772/6 "2004-12-02T21:51:41Z")
> [@FilmGeek](#):
>
> Supersede and supercede are both right.
>
> So are miniscule and minuscule.
I knew about supersede and supercede. I have written about it here before. I did not know both miniscule and minuscule were ok. So I am 7/10! Though not BBC official. So back to 6/10.
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### Author:  [@Lobsang](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobsang)
#### Post date: [December 2, 2004, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-good-is-your-spelling/277772/7 "2004-12-02T21:52:13Z")
> [@FilmGeek](#):
>
> Supersede and supercede are both right.
>
> So are miniscule and minuscule.
>
> So. I reject this test.
If that’s true I scored 8.
P.s. after the test I tried both (my spellings) in Word. It rejected them as erroneous
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### Author:  [@fishbicycle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fishbicycle)
#### Post date: [December 2, 2004, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-good-is-your-spelling/277772/8 "2004-12-02T21:52:17Z")
10/10.
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### Author:  [@Ilsa\_Lund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ilsa_Lund)
#### Post date: [December 2, 2004, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-good-is-your-spelling/277772/9 "2004-12-02T21:55:02Z")
I think there is a color/colour discrepancy here. Bogus test.
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### Author:  [@Kalhoun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kalhoun)
#### Post date: [December 2, 2004, 9:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-good-is-your-spelling/277772/10 "2004-12-02T21:56:55Z")
> [@Lobsang](#):
>
> If that’s true I scored 8.
>
> P.s. after the test I tried both (my spellings) in Word. It rejected them as erroneous
I scored 10 on this rule.
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### Author:  [@InvidiousCourgette](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/InvidiousCourgette)
#### Post date: [December 2, 2004, 9:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-good-is-your-spelling/277772/11 "2004-12-02T21:58:32Z")
> [@fishbicycle](#):
>
> 10/10.
Hmmph. Can you do dead hard sums as well though? huh? huh? 🙂
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### Author:  [@Cunctator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cunctator)
#### Post date: [December 2, 2004, 9:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-good-is-your-spelling/277772/12 "2004-12-02T21:58:54Z")
10/10
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### Author:  [@Scarlett67](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scarlett67)
#### Post date: [December 2, 2004, 10:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-good-is-your-spelling/277772/13 "2004-12-02T22:07:28Z")
10/10.
I’d like to see a valid cite for “miniscule” being correct. MW11 says this (bolding mine):
> [@](#):
>
> Main Entry: miniscule
>
> . . .
>
> variant of MINUSCULE
> usage The adjective minuscule is etymologically related to minus, but associations with mini- have produced the spelling variant miniscule. This variant dates to the end of the 19th century, and it now occurs commonly in published writing, **but it continues to be widely regarded as an error.**
Similarly for “supercede.”
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### Author:  [@Lobsang](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobsang)
#### Post date: [December 2, 2004, 10:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-good-is-your-spelling/277772/14 "2004-12-02T22:12:53Z")
> [@Scarlett67](#):
>
> 10/10.
>
> I’d like to see a valid cite for “miniscule” being correct. MW11 says this (bolding mine):
> Similarly for “supercede.”
> [@dictionary.com](#):
>
> min·is·cule ( P ) Pronunciation Key (mn-skyl)
> adj.
> Variant of minuscule.
>
> min·us·cule ( P ) Pronunciation Key (mn-skyl, m-nskyl) also min·is·cule (mn-skyl)
> adj.
> Very small; tiny. See Synonyms at small.
> Of, relating to, or written in miniscule.
dot dot.
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### Author:  [@fishbicycle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fishbicycle)
#### Post date: [December 2, 2004, 10:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-good-is-your-spelling/277772/15 "2004-12-02T22:14:09Z")
> [@InvidiousCourgette](#):
>
> Hmmph. Can you do dead hard sums as well though? huh? huh? 🙂
Nope. I didn’t get the math gene. Sorry!
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### Author:  [@matt\_mcl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/matt_mcl)
#### Post date: [December 2, 2004, 10:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-good-is-your-spelling/277772/16 "2004-12-02T22:17:22Z")
> [@Ilsa\_Lund](#):
>
> I think there is a color/colour discrepancy here. Bogus test.
10/10.
I didn’t see any words in the test for which I know that standard spelling differs between the UK and the US.
“Supercede” and “miniscule” are indeed errors, based on a false analogy with “cede” (the suffix is from sedere, to sit - i.e. to sit above - not caedere, to fall) and “mini-”. My Random House Webster’s (US) and Canadian Oxford agree, although the Random House describes “miniscule” as a spelling error that is now so common that “many” regard it as a variant spelling.
“Accommodate” was the most difficult one for me. I know it has two c’s, but for the m’s I just have to remember that “commode” and “commodious” have two m’s as well.
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### Author:  [@Colophon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colophon)
#### Post date: [December 2, 2004, 10:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-good-is-your-spelling/277772/17 "2004-12-02T22:19:05Z")
9/10 for me… i got “harass” wrong (I chose harrass :smack: )
Considering I work as a copy editor that is quite poor, although in my defence I would have looked that one up if I came across it at work.
And for all those who say “supercede” and “miniscule” are “acceptable variants”, I say “balderdash” 😉
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### Author:  [@Colophon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colophon)
#### Post date: [December 2, 2004, 10:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-good-is-your-spelling/277772/18 "2004-12-02T22:22:57Z")
(I wonder if those that insist that “miniscule” is OK would also accept “majiscule” as its opposite?)
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### Author:  [@InvidiousCourgette](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/InvidiousCourgette)
#### Post date: [December 2, 2004, 10:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-good-is-your-spelling/277772/19 "2004-12-02T22:28:52Z")
I thought I had done OK at 6/10. Now I am feeling the bluntest tool in the block. Has ANYONE done worse than me? 😛
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### Author:  [@Hal\_Briston](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hal_Briston)
#### Post date: [December 2, 2004, 10:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-good-is-your-spelling/277772/20 "2004-12-02T22:30:06Z")
Woohoo! 10 outta 10!
_I am so smart…I am so smart…S-M-R-T…I mean S-M-A-R-T…_
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