~ = symmetric relationships
→ = asymmetric ones
+ = words manipulated together
, = words manipulated separately
− = deletion
Alternade
A word or phrase is divided into two or more others by taking
alternate letters in order.
schooled → shoe + cold;
lacerated → let + are + cad
Ambigram
An anagram
or antigram, depending on personal opinion.
See guide.
Anagram
An appropriate transposal.
is tempo, sirs ~ prestissimo
Antigram
An opposite transposal.
the budgerigar ≠ great huge bird (it's a parakeet)
Backswitch
A word or phrase becomes another when its last letter is
changed (or "switched") and the remaining letters are reversed
("turned back"). See also Switchback.
autumn → mutual; dragnet → en garde
Baltimore deletion
Each letter in turn is removed to form a new word.
peat → eat, pat, pet, pea
Baltimore transdeletion
A word or entry phrase is turned into a series of
others by removing each letter in turn and rearranging the rest.
baker → rake, kerb, bare, bark, beak
Beheadment
A word or phrase becomes another when its first letter is
removed.
usable → sable; aspirate → spirate → pirate → irate
→ rate → ate
Brookline letter-change
A word or phrase changes each one of its letters in turn to
make others.
rice → nice, race, rile, rich
Change of heart
A change of heart is similar to a Double-Cross in that two
words or phrases switch a letter or string of letters, but the things being
switched aren't necessarily located at the ends of words.
share + colt → sole + chart
Changeover
A word or phrase becomes another when one letter changes to
another and moves to another location.
goatherd → gathered (2nd to 7th)
Charade
A word or phrase is broken into two or more shorter ones.
outreached → outre + ached
Combination padlock
A padlock, with the added feature that
overlapping the two words produces a fourth word or phrase.
scar + Arab →
scarab → scab
Consonantcy
Two or more words or phrases share the same consonants in the
same order, with any number of vowels (incl. Y).
acorn ~ crayon ~ ocarina; begin ~ beguine ~ begonia
Curtailment
A word or phrase becomes another when its last letter is
removed.
stingy → sting
Deletion
A word or phrase becomes another when an interior letter is
removed.
simile → smile
Double Acrostical Enigma (AE)
An AE with two solutions.
Seeguide.
Double-cross
Two words or phrases are each divided into two pieces; then
their second pieces are switched to form two others.
maids + rapture ~ mature
+ rapids
[ma/ids, rap/ture]
Dropout
Two words are joined; then one word is
dropped out to form another from the leftover letters.
reamer + itch → reach
+ merit
[rea(mer, it)ch]
Enigma
A word or phrase is clued indirectly through wordplay.
Generally, a riddle describes a thing and an enigma a word.
See guide.
Enigmatic rebus
Enigmatic is a red flag, warning you that the
reading involves something other than simple manipulation of letters.
See guide.
False derivatives
A word or phrase becomes another when some grammatical change
is inappropriately applied.
limb → limber (false comparative);
treat → retreat (false reiterative);
butter → buttress (false feminine, analogous to waiter → waitress)
FWNFR
"Flats we never finish reading" were added to the guide in 2004.
See guide
Head-to-tail shift
A word or phrase becomes another when its first letter is moved
to its end.
emanate → manatee
Heart transplant
In a heart transplant, a letter or series of letters is taken
from inside one word and transplanted to another.
clear + wild →
car + willed
Heteronym
Two words or phrases with the same spelling are used with
different pronunciations and meanings.
mustache ~ must ache
Homoantonym
Two words or phrases sound like two other words that are
antonyms.
knights, daze (sounds like nights, days)
Homoconcominym
Two words or phrases sound like two other words or phrases that
form a familiar pair.
hart, sole (sounds like heart, soul)
Homonym
Two or more unrelated words or phrases are pronounced the same
but spelled differently.
hair ~ hare
Homosynonym
Two words or phrases sound like two other words that are
synonyms.
soul, loan (sounds like sole, lone)
Interlock
Two or more shorter words or phrases are interlocked to form a
longer one. (But not in a regular pattern like the alternade.)
fig + rebus → firebugs
Letter bank
A word or phrase (the "bank") is chosen that has no repeated
letters. One or more longer words or phrases are formed, each using all the
letters in the bank at least once and as many more times as needed.
lens → senselessness; manicures → Neiman Marcus, American
sumac, marine insurance
Letter change
A specified letter is changed to make a new word or phrase.
3rd letter: pastry ~ pantry
Letter shift
A word or phrase becomes another when one letter is shifted to
a new position.
Proust ~ sprout
Linkade
A word or phrase is broken into two or more shorter parts,
which overlap by exactly one letter.
libraries → Libra + Aries
Literatim
Words or phrases are composed by pronouncing the letters of a
base word individually or in combinations.
vacations → essay (SA) + ivy (IV) + eighty (AT) + envy (NV)
Metathesis
A word or phrase becomes another when two letters are
interchanged.
converse ~ conserve
Mutation
A transposal that is only vaguely appropriate or even
entirely inappropriate.
See guide.
Mynoreteh
A reversed heteronym.
won ton ~ not now
Padlock
The last two or more letters of a word or phrase are the
same as the first two or more letters of another; joining the remaining
letters forms another (the lock).
norther + thermal → normal
Palindrome
A sentence or phrase is spelled the same forward as
backward.
Draw pupil's lip upward
Phrase Shift
In a phrase shift, an adage, well-known quotation, or cliche is
remade by shifting a letter from one word to another.
The buck sops there; don't give UPS the hip
Rebade
A hybrid of the rebus and
alternade.
See guide.
Rebus
A word or phrase is represented by letters,
numbers, or symbols; their positions; and sometimes related letter-play, like
alterations to the verse.
See guide.
Repeated letter change
A word or phrase becomes another when one letter is
changed to another letter wherever it appears. The letter must appear at least
twice and the change must be reversible.
crochet ~ prophet; skunk ~ stunt ~ sauna
Repeated letter or Word deletion
A word or phrase becomes another when one letter or word is
removed wherever it occurs.
bassist − S → bait; prospered − P → rose-red; had
it made − ad → hit me
Reversal
A word or phrase becomes another when reversed.
desserts ~ stressed.
Reversed puzzles
A variation of a puzzle in which you have to
reverse the result to read the final solution.
See guide.
Riddle
Something is described enigmatically in verse.
Generally, a riddle describes a thing and an enigma is a word.
See guide.
*Rochester transaddition
Each letter in a baseword is added back to the word and the
result transposed.
nacre → canner, arcane, cancer, craner, careen
Sound change
One sound is changed in a word or phrase to make
another.
legroom ~ legume
Sound shift
A word or phrase becomes another when its first sound is moved
to its end.
ciao → ouch
Spoonergram
A phrase or word becomes another when the initial
consonant sounds in its component words (or stressed syllables) are swapped.
Word boundaries do not need to be preserved.
key ring ~ reeking; trained seal ~ strained eel;
rake over the coals ~ cake over the rolls
Subade
A hybrid of the suber and alternade
or a reversed rebade.
See guide.
Suber
A reversed rebus.
See guide.
Switchback
A word or phrase becomes another when its first letter is changed, or
"switched", and the remaining letters are reversed, or "turned back". See also
Backswitch.
hydra → tardy
Terminal deletion
A word or phrase is changed to another by removing
its first and last letters.
foregone → Oregon
Transaddition
This flat type is always classified as a
transdeletion.
Transade
A transposed charade.
A word or phrase is broken up into two or more shorter parts. Each shorter part
is transposed (separately) to make a word.
solu + tion → soul + into
Transdeletion
A word or phrase becomes another when one letter is
deleted and the others are transposed. There must be at least four parts and
simple deletions are not used.
righteous − I → roughest - E → troughs − R → sought
− U → ghost
− G → shot − S → tho
Transpogram
A word or phrase becomes another when divided into
two parts, which are interchanged.
rock-hard ~ hard rock; alloy ~ loyal
Transposal
A word or phrase becomes another when its letters
are rearranged. A flat is only classified as a transposal when it doesn't match
a specific transposal type, such as metathesis, reversal or
transpogram. [NOTE: A transposal is commonly called an anagram outside the NPL. In the NPL, an
anagram is always an appropriate transposal.]
sleuth ~ hustle
Word deletion
A word or phrase is deleted from a longer one,
leaving another word or phrase. In a multi-word deletion, two or more consecutive
words are deleted. In a progressive word-deletion, three or more words are nested to
form a longer one.
performance − man → perforce;
organgrinder − gang rin → order;
consecratory − Ra − sector → cony
Word substitution
A word or phrase is replaced by another in a longer
one, producing a different word or phrase.
progress ~ congress [pro/con-gress];
Bigram puzzles
Two-letter groups (bigrams) are the basic unit of these
puzzles.
seraph ~ phrase (bigram reversal); we're aka Krewe (bigram
palindrome)
Group puzzles
Each of the answer words or phrases is related to a member of a
well-known group in the manner of a specified flat type.
sate, stew, shout, thorn ~ east, west, south, north (transposal
group)
Phonetic puzzles
Puzzle variations in which sounds are the basic
unit instead of letters.
quest → west (phonetic beheadment)
Progressive puzzles
A sequence of three or more of a given flat type.
padre, retrench, trenchant,
anthem, hemlock, padlock (progressive padlock)
*Synonym puzzles
A puzzle variation using synonms. For example, in a synonym
deletion, a synonym of the main base word has letters which are a subset
of the letters in the main word. Remove those letters, and what remains, in that
order, spells the second word. The synonym might be a synonym for a sense of the
main word other than the one used in the flat. For a synonym substitution,
replace a word with it's
against − anti → gas (synonym deletion)
Trigram puzzles
Three-letter groups (trigrams) are the basic unit of these
puzzles.
*Bridgewater transaddition
A generalization of the Rochester Transaddition. You begin with
an n-letter BASE word and an m-letter BANK word (note: n and m do not need to be
equal, as they are here). The other solwords, numbered ONE though M, are formed
by transposing _all_ the letters in BASE plus each of the m letters from BANK in
turn (so it's nice if BANK is an isogram). Another example: BASE = cast iron,
BANK = atone, ONE = raincoats, TWO = tractions, THREE = consortia, FOUR =
transonic, FIVE = creations.
cast iron + atone → raincoats, tractions, consortia, transonic,
creations
*Convergence
A word or phrase is broken down into a series of shorter words
and phrases by taking letters in order from the the original phrase - one from
the front, then one from the back, then one from the front, and so on.
sapwort → star + pow
*Hutto transdeletion
A word or phrase has every possible pair of letters deleted,
and each time the resulting set of letters is transposed to form another word.
The cuewords in the following example indicate which pair of letters has to be
deleted; the original word must also appear in the flat. This flat type
generates a very large number of solution words: a base word of length 5 would
require eleven; the example given has a seven letter base word, which results in
twenty two words to be clued.
tirades → 12 dares, 13 ideas, 14 rides, 15 raise, 16 raids, 17
aired, 23 stead, 24 drest, 25 rates, 26 darts, 27 tread, 34 deist, 35 iteas, 36
staid, 37 Edita, 45 rites, 46 strid, 47 tried, 56 stair, 57 irate, 67 triad
*Lakeway changeover
A set of words such that any two of them form a changeover
base, with every possible letter position included.
that, heat, hart, hats
*Letter Bankless
A letter bank where the minimal set of letters is not included
in the base. This is most likely to be done because the minimal set will not
transpose into a word.
green around the gills ~ Thousand Island dressing
*Lock & Drop
A lock and drop is like a padlock, except that in addition, the
overlapping letters form a word.
lethal + halter → Hal + letter
*Multiple repeated-letter deletion
Like a repeated-letter deletion, except that all occurrences of
any repeated letters are deleted.
statism → aim; catacomb → tomb
*Mutual replacement
Two letters replace each other each time they appear in a word.
sell → less; travail → trivial
*Name Change
A substring of one word is a proper name and is replaced by
another proper name to form another word. The proper names are not individually
clued.
Avalon → Avedon (Al → Ed); camel → cachet (Mel → Chet)
*Permuted consonantcy
In the Permuted Consonantcy, all permutations of the consonant
letters appear once. For example, in a three-consonant flat, with all consonants
different (which the following example is), the six squares might, in order,
contain the following consonant sequences:
KLM, KML, LKM, LMK, MKL, MLK.
Consonants might also be repeated:
XXZZ, XZXZ, XZZX, ZXXZ, ZXZX, ZZXX.
eclair, cairo IL, ulcer, lyric, oracle, relic
*Reduplication
The base of a reduplication is such that the letters in the
first half are repeated in the second half.
edit|ed it; Saint Theresa in the len|s. Ain't there Saint Helen
*Split Shift
In a split shift, two (or more) of the base words start and end
with identical sequences of letters. Linking the dissimilar parts makes another
word.
elegant + element
→ game
*Terminal letter change
The first and last letters of a word are both changed.
Spiderman ~ epidermal
*Terminal Rotation
A pair of words becomes another pair of words when all four
terminal letters shift position in a manner analogous to rotating tires on a
car: each front letter moves to the end, while the back letters move in front
and switch words.
tend + bums → sent + dumb
*Trans-cross
A trans-cross is similar to a double cross, but the pieces of
the word switch AB, CD, AC, BD.
seal + rely → sere + ally
*Transinterlock
An interlock in which one of the shorter pieces is tranposed. ?
an immediate action / a meditation / cinema
Most examples are taken from the Guide, where appropriate credits are given.