A pretty easy Azed this week: with some judicious guessing of unfamiliar words (which one gets quite good at after solving these puzzles for several decades) I managed to finish this in less than an hour with no aids at all. On the other hand, writing up the blog has required numerous references to Chambers to confirm the details.
| Across | |
| 1. FLOSSY | F + LOSS + Y |
| 7. BOURGS | BURGOS with the O “out of place”. I can’t confirm the etymology of Burgos, but it seems likely that it comes from the same root as “bourg”, which would make this clue rather unsatisfactory. |
| 12. LIRIPIPE | I RIP in PILE*. One definition of LIRIPIPE is “a silly person”, the clue just has “silly”, as in “oh, you are a silly”. |
| 13. VERA | (A REV)< – Vera Lynn, the Forces' Sweetheart |
| 14. WATERMEN | A TERM in WEN |
| 15. MAIDEN-TONGUED | AID in MENTON + GU[I]DE*, with “not Italy” misleadingly applying to what follows. |
| 16. PICINE | PI + CINE. The word means related to the genus Picus: the woodpeckers. |
| 17. TOSH | [Macin]TOSH |
| 19. SMUG | GUMS< and two definitions: to steal (nick) and a smug person |
| 22. DESI | DESIRE less RE (rupee). Chambers defines the word as “authentically Asian” |
| 23. SCUR | [I]S CUR[T]. Scur is “same as Skirr”, which can mean to scurry, or to “beetle” (Shakespearian, so “old-style”) |
| 24. ABURST | S[hell] in A BURT |
| 28. PLASMODESMATA | MODES in (A LAMP SAT)* |
| 30. PARIETAL | IE in PART AL[L] |
| 31. ANIS | Hidden in “flockS IN Antigua” reversed &lit – the Ani is a tropical American bird |
| 32. ASPIRE TO | ISOPTERA* |
| 33. NOSTOS | A “Nostos” is a (literary) homecoming: for example the final section of Homer’s Odyssey. The wordplay almost had me stumped here, but just in time I see it’s T (= Troy, as in weight) in the reverse of SO (“in due course”, according to Chambers) + SON. |
| 34. GLADES | LADE (form of “ladel” as a verb) in G+S. As You Like It is set in the Forest of Arden, so glades might be needed for its scenery. |
| Down | |
| 1. FLUMP | F + LUMP. Chambers confirms LUMP=dislike: I wonder if that comes from a misunderstanding of the phrase “like it or lump it”. |
| 2. LITAI | Composite anag &lit – LITAI + A HUN gives an anagram of LITHUANIA, whose unit of currency is the Litas, plural LITAI. |
| 3. ORBICULARIS | I in (RUBRIC ALSO)* |
| 4. SINDI | Homophone of “Cindy” or “Sindy” – a short form of Cynthia; and a language sdpoken in the province of Sind in Pakistan. General Sir Charles James Napier is famously supposed to have sent the punning one-word telegram “peccavi” (“I have sinned”) after capturing the province. |
| 5. SPLENIC | PL in [AR]SENIC (Chemical symbol As) |
| 6. SPATTERDASH | PATTER ‘D in SASH |
| 7. BETOOK | BET + O + OK. Past tense of “betake”, which, used reflexively, as e.g. in “betakes himself” means to go – so in the past tense “went”. |
| 8. OXEN | Hidden in cOX Enthusiastically |
| 9. REMUNERATED | M + (RUE ANTE)* in RED |
| 10. GREENS | GREEN + S |
| 11. SANDHI | DANISH* |
| 18. SUBSOIL | SUBS (advance payments) + OIL (bribe) |
| 19. SAPPAN | SA + P + PAN. Defined as “Brazil wood”, which can also be called just “Brazil”. |
| 20. MELANO | ELAN in MO |
| 21. QUOTAS | QU + (AS TO)* |
| 25. UMBRA | RUMBA with R (the “head”) moved “further down” |
| 26. STATE | T in SATE |
| 27. TACOS | O in SCAT< |
| 29. MENO | MEN + O. “Meno” is Italian for “less”, and in used is musical markings (hence “score”) such as meno mosso = less movement = slower. |
I am relieved that you have found a convincing explanation for 5D. Not being very good at chemistry, I tried to cobble something together from ‘as’ = ‘since’. I discovered that ‘since’ could be transformed into ‘senic’ by two ‘surgical operations’, each time using one letter as a ‘scalpel’ to make an incision between two others. Stage 1: ‘i’ cuts between ‘n’ and ‘c’ to leave ‘snice’. Stage 2: ‘e’ cuts between ‘s’ and ‘n’ to leave ‘senic’. Bizarre, but true.
I took 33A to be an &lit.
Thanks for explaining some workings that I couldn’t see. I struggled with Azed this week but did finish it with some guesses and Google. I didn’t refer to Chambers. Much easier to lug the Internet around on your phone 🙂
7a. Burgos is a town in Spain
I finished it, but, as usual with very little idea why for several of the clues. And now I see some mistakes. Got OSCINE for 16a after FLYMO for 1d (last, desperate one in). But then I had LITAS for 2d. Sigh!
Thanks, Andrew, as you say, fairly easy.You may be correct on BOURG and BURGOS having the same root. All I can find is this: BOURG -Middle English, from Anglo-French burc, borghe, from Latin burgus fortified place, of Germanic origin; akin to Old High German burg fortified place.(Webster)
BURGOS – (a) Visigothic name … signified consolidated walled villages (Gothic baurgs)(Wikipedia).
That’s the problem with crosswords – you fritter away time chasing down trivia!
7a. Oh come on chaps. “Nothing (= o) out of place in Spanish town (Burgos) or towns” (= bourgs, see Chambers definition of bourg). You will find Burgos,the Spanish city in Wikipedia too.
An excellent Azed, is there any other??? To be honest the level of difficulty here was average, not too easy and not too tough. A couple of tricky ones to boot. Favorite clue – probably 17a for it’s simplicity.