Lexifour

Journal

Answers and explanations from past Daily Challenges, plus the origins and stories behind words from our weekly newsletter.

From the newsletter

Outlandish first meant from another land

Old English utlendisc meant foreign or not native. It was formed from utland, a foreign land, plus the adjective-forming ending that became -ish.

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Slapstick comedy was named after an actual stick

A slapstick was a theatrical clapper made from two wooden slats joined at one end. When used in a staged blow, the pieces struck one another and produced a conspicuously loud crack, magnifying the sound of the action.

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Past challenge questions

Missed a word? Revisit the clue, compare the choices, and read why the answer fits. These are the original questions from completed challenges, with any recorded quality issues marked alongside them. How we prepare and review content.

October 6, 2026

Journal

From the newsletter

Outlandish first meant from another land

Slapstick comedy was named after an actual stick

Past challenge questions

stoically, contest, mandola, suppliant, dittany

triumph, niggle, autarchy, mustelid, attorn

esteemed, relate, assignor, derogate, prolepsis

frontwards, factor, repartee, agraphia, graticule

agonised, regiment, strident, psilocin, appanage

designed, privilege, undertow, obduracy, prehend

deciding, stimulus, airframe, recusant, charlock

clue, buffalo, disclaim, darkling, kurrajong

overcome, sometime, largesse, pizzicato, fugacity

enough, received, wantonly, gormless, cauline

premiere, premise, quicksilver, grizzle, berretta

firmness, bifacial, twirp, scabrous, escolar

airlift, actuate, collator, keeshond, alkahest

engineer, skulker, enceinte, spikenard, marocain

horseman, proximal, hautbois, komondor, dithyramb

manifold, exultantly, skirl, agrimony, flexuous

engrave, stigmatise, spritsail, maculate, epiphora

robotics, suffuse, petrous, theogony, scabiosa

longhorn, calliper, antiphony, vermiform, courante

tarragon, glibness, clawfoot, pahoehoe, capitate

cockatoo, equivocally, raiment, rubicund, zwieback

bereaved, ideograph, archaean, greisen, tamandua

scavenge, poultice, blether, barde, macaronic

devastate, reputably, dinge, concomitant, cringle

reproach, bimanual, demulcent, bathetic, lorgnette

language, coherent, instigate, akimbo, boneshaker

passion, polished, latterly, quisling, antedate

disorder, ingenuity, filch, mastaba

exclusively, arguably, disaffection, deride, clitic

actually, evidently, catastrophically, orbicular, necromantic

augment, wail, allegretto, epenthesis

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