Comments on: Independent 6847 by Nimrod

By: Barbara

Barbara — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 14:32:09 +0000

cowboy outfit:
Also note that “Botchers R Us”, minus the Bch, is an anagram of trousers.

By: Testy

Testy — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 15:58:09 +0000

I know we often tend to think of everything Greek as being ancient but aren’t Rho and Chi in the modern Greek alphabet too?

By: nmsindy

nmsindy — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 15:18:52 +0000

MOCKERS I should have explained ‘put the mockers on’. I’d thought it was more well-known. A quick look at dicts shows they generally explain it, however.

By: mhl

mhl — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 15:12:54 +0000

Thank you for explaining that, Colin.

By: nmsindy

nmsindy — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 15:08:37 +0000

Re comment 5, I thought the ‘aging’ was as it was the old Greek alphabet.

By: Colin Blackburn

Colin Blackburn — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 14:29:43 +0000

Just been forced to go downstairs and consult Brewers. It suggests that it was Australian slang from early 20th century but may have originated in English markets prior to that. A suggestion is that it is from the Hebrew ‘makot’, via the Yiddish ‘makkes’, meaning plagues or visitations.

By: Colin Blackburn

Colin Blackburn — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 14:25:02 +0000

‘put the mockers on’ is slang meaning ‘to put an end to’, ‘put paid to’

Chambers doesn’t give it direct derivation but it is part of ‘mock’

By: mhl

mhl — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 14:10:50 +0000

Blimey, well done to anyone who finished this one! The clues I managed to get were fun though.

Could someone help me out with the “those put on to end proceedings” meaning of MOCKERS?

19 across is bizarre.

By: Testy

Testy — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 13:33:35 +0000

PS I forgot to say that I didn’t understand the necessity for “Aging” in 12A

By: Testy

Testy — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 13:25:36 +0000

1D To me “all but the first three” suggests ICERETURNS or perhaps ICEURNS. I can’t quite interpret it as “just the first three of each word”

To me 10D is a craptic definition.

23a is presumably a DD, “revolutionary activity” being CURLING in the twisting round sense.

Is there a Nina that I’m missing which merited the inclusion of (to my mind) obscure words like RHONCHI, ELENCHI, PEE EM?

There were quite a few good ones too though (I liked POLICE CAR).