Compound words with SOME

SOME is a hinge word: 3 words make a compound in front of it and 9 make one after it, so it can sit in the middle of a chain and hold two compounds together at once.

Words that go in front of SOME

Each of these makes a compound ending in SOME.

• fearsome — fear + some
• troublesome — trouble + some
• wholesome — whole + some

Words that follow SOME

Each of these makes a compound starting with SOME.

• somebody — some + body
• someday — some + day
• somehow — some + how
• someone — some + one
• someplace — some + place
• something — some + thing
• sometime — some + time
• somewhat — some + what
• somewhere — some + where

Why SOME joins on both sides

SOME is a quantifier that fossilised into a small closed set of compounds: SOMEDAY, SOMETHING, SOMEWHERE. HANDSOME belongs to the same family, from an older sense of easy to handle.

Bridges you can build through SOME

Put any word from the first list in front and any word from the second behind, and you have a three-word chain in which both neighbouring pairs join. Here are some of them.

• FEAR → SOME → BODY — fearsome and somebody
• TROUBLE → SOME → DAY — troublesome and someday
• WHOLE → SOME → HOW — wholesome and somehow

Play a bridge

KEYSTONE is a free daily puzzle built entirely out of chains like these. You get the two ends and have to fill the two words in the middle. Three bridges a day, no account, no cookies.

Play today's KEYSTONE

Other hinge words

Each of these has a page like this one. There is also an index of all 28.

BACK · BALL · BED · BOARD · BOOK · BREAK · DAY · DOWN · FALL · FIRE · GUN · HAND · HEAD · HOUSE · LAND · LIFE · LIGHT · MAN · NIGHT · OFF · OUT · OVER · SHIP · SIDE · TIME · WAY · WORK