Previously in this space, I examined word games such as Boggle, Bananagrams, Scrabble, and of course the hot new thing, Wordle. Since then, the Wordle phenomenon has taken on new dimensions, with an astonishing array of variants, copycats, and homages. There’s Lewdle, which is Wordle but for “dirty” words. There’s a host of Wordle variants that play on the same format, only with geography rather than lexicography. There’s Airportle, which requires guessers to figure out the right three-letter airport code. There is the nearly identical pair, Worldle and Globle, which require you to guess the country based on a map shape and feedback about where your guess is relative to the correct answer. Most recently, I discovered Heardle, which gives you the notes of a song, first just a second, then more and more, until you guess it. It selects bad songs, but it’s a fun idea.

There are the variants that multiply Wordles you have to answer at once in a grid: Dordle (double Wordle), Quardle, Octordle, and the genuinely unwieldy Sedecordle. Sedec-, in case you don’t memorize such things, is the prefix for sixteen from the Latin. Number words are hard. Hectares aren’t named for the Greek for six ordinal places, hect; they’re named for hekaton, the Greek number 100. It is an area equal to a square with 100-meter sides. The Old Testament book Deuteronomy gets its name from deuter, for twice, making it mean “second law” or “repeat.” God’s “ahem.”