CHAPTER 42

Using ical, acle, icle

Here is another set of suffixes that appear at first glance to be tricky but are actually quite simple.

Spelling rule #1: Words ending in ical are almost always adjectives. There are well over three
hundred of them. A tiny sample:

(^) Spelling rule #2: Words ending in acle and icle are almost always nouns. There are about three
dozen of them.
(^) Note that there is very little difference between the two suffixes acle and icle. Logically, they should
all be spelled with the icle ending, but, because of the origin of the root word, we have a division:
(1) Words ending in acle:
(^) (2) And words ending in icle:
(^) Note that although the words in this group have an ending that sounds rather like cul there is no
commonly used English word that actually ends in cul.
And only four words end in col: