The Spell of the Holidays
The Blue Book of Grammar and Punctuation
The Spell of the Holidays
The year-end holidays are an alternate reality. People dress differently, act differently … and even talk differently. This time of year has its own vocabulary, and some of these old-fashioned words have eccentric spellings. So here is our holiday spelling quiz. You’ll find the answers directly below.
1. ___ the night before Christmas.
A) T’was
B) ‘Twas
C) ‘T’was
D) Twas
2. They have a live ___ down at the shopping mall.
A) raindeer
B) reindeer
C) raindear
D) reindere
3. It was a festive ___ gathering.
A) yueltide
B) yuletyde
C) yueltied
D) yuletide
4. Please! Go easy on the ___.
A) egg nog
B) eggnawg
C) eggnog
D) egg nogg
5. Our ___ holds nine candles.
A) menorah
B) mennorah
C) mennora
D) menorrah
6. “Santa Claus” refers to ___.
A) Saint Nicholas
B) Saint Nichlaus
C) Saint Nicalos
D) Saint Nichollas
7. In European folklore, ___ is considered magical.
A) misletoe
B) mistletoe
C) missletoe
D) misiltoe
8. The winter ___ falls on December 22 this year.
A) soulstice
B) sollstise
C) solstise
D) solstice
9. “O little town of ___.”
A) Bethlahem
B) Bethleham
C) Bethlehem
D) Bethelhem
10. Stop spinning that ___ and join us for dinner.
A) dradle
B) dreidle
C) draydel
D) dreidel
ANSWERS
1: B) ‘Twas
2: B) reindeer
3: D) yuletide
4: C) eggnog
5: A) menorah
6: A) Saint Nicholas
7: B) mistletoe
8: D) solstice
9: C) Bethlehem
10: D) dreidel
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This was fun. I enjoyed it. I think I got them all correct.
Question 5:
E. None of the above.
Nine candles is a hannukiah; seven candles is a menorah.
This is most interesting; thank you for the information. Even our Jewish staff members were unaware of this differentiation. Nonetheless, for the purpose of our spelling exercise, we’re going to leave the question as is and avoid dealing with the spelling variations of Hannukah and hanukkiah.