Consider the word 'cheat'. Removing letters one at a time will leave a sequence of words, all the way down to one letter:

cheat
heat
hat
at
a

What is the longest word with this property?

Allowing for occurance of obsolete/obscure words and proper names , an 11 letter word (Emasculated) with this property is possible, since:

Emasculated
Emasculate
Masculate(obsolete word; meaning, to make stong)
Maculate(blotchy)
Maculae (plural of macula, variant of macule)
Macule (skin spot) 
Macle (mineral)
Mace (spice)
Mac(raincoat, British)
Ma (mother)
A

SOURCE:

http://www.answers.com/topic/english-words-with-uncommon-properties

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_unusual_English_words

 

Edited on April 16, 2007, 3:03 pm

Posted by K Sengupta on 2007-04-16 14:56:19