Quiptic 869 by Pan

21 comments on “Quiptic 869 by Pan”

1. Thanks Pan and nms
   Quite tricky in places, with some fairly obscure solutions – HOOKE’S LAW, TETRARCH and ADUMBRATE (I had to look up the latter!)

2. Thanks Pan and nms.
   This was pitch perfect for a Quiptic, and graced by surfaces which don’t look anything like crossword clues. Always a sign of quality.

   I didn’t see any of the answers as obscure though.

3. I agree re the number of Es in 2dn. Was hopeful 9dn heralded a theme, but alas, no.

   Like muffin @1, I also thought those clues were slightly more challenging but not unfair. It is particularly apt that Hooke originally stated his law as an anagram.

4. Thanks both. Agree that 2d looks like a mistake.
   19a: I know I am being dim, but why is R=take?

5. Thank you Pan and newmarketsausage.

   An enjoyable Quiptic. I also wonder how R = take? The clue for HOOK’S LAW is brilliant, well spotted Swatty @3!

6. correction, HOOKE’S LAW, apologies.

7. Not being dim at all, Shirl. Take = R is one of those peculiar crosswordisms you occasionally come across.

   Someone will be able to explain its origin better than me but I seem to remember reading somewhere that R. is an abbreviation for a Latin imperative verb meaning ‘take’. It apparently used to be written on medical prescriptions as an instruction.

   If I’m remembering correctly, the word ‘recipe’ is from the same root, I think. Or is ‘recipe’ the imperative form of the verb?

   Where are all our Latin scholars when you need them?

8. nms @7, but take = Rx, recipe = Rp, R = rectal medically.

9. Thanks Pan & nms.

   A bit tricky for a Quiptic I thought, like muffin @1.

   nms @7; not a Latin scholar but: “Take” for R, abbreviation of the Latin word recipe, meaning “take”.

10. … and recipe=Latin, sing. imperative of recipere, to take, receive;

11. Is it just me, or should 12A be two words?

12. Thanks all for the r = take information. Very handy, this site!

13. Yes, realthog @ 11. Collins, ODE and Chambers all have ‘sweet talk’ or ‘sweet-talk’.

    On ‘take’ = R, after exhaustive research among the shelves at the British Library – Atishoo! Sorry, that was the dust – 🙂 I came across this in one of its commentaries on entries in the OED:

    ‘Tracing the origin of [recipe], one visualises spice cupboards, kitchens, chefs notebooks, even TV dinners. More surprisingly perhaps, we’re also transported to medicine cabinets and apothecary’s shops. The word derives from the Latin verb recipre (sic), meaning to receive. As this OED entry tells us, recipe appears to have entered the English language in the 1400s. At this time it was common for physicians to place the word recipe (the 2nd person singular imperative of the verb recipere) at the top of prescriptions, before listing the ingredients that the patient should ‘receive’ for his or her medical remedy. Amazingly, the first citation for the word in relation to cookery is as late as 1716. Before the 1700s, the everyday word for a culinary recipe was receipt. This word also derives from the Latin recipere.’

    I believe the first recorded use of ‘take’ for R in a cryptic crossword was in a Ximenes puzzle of 1423 (although I might have got that bit wrong) 🙂

14. Apart from some things already mentioned above (and one other), I thought this was exactly what a Quiptic should be.
    ‘Adumbrate’ and ‘tetrarch’ may perhaps be obscure words but they were clued in such a way that they were eminently gettable.

    A pity of the mistake in 2d.
    Unfortunately, a correct(ed) clue is not that easy to produce without ruining the surface.
    Like others, I also wondered about ‘sweet/talk’ as one word.
    The ‘other thing’ I mentioned in my first line is the W in 9d, which is surely not ‘woman’ – should be ‘women’.

    ‘Take’ = R I’ve never come across in real life but all the more in crosswords.
    When I first saw it, I put it straight into my head (to not forget it anymore).
    It’s an abbreviation that often works one way.
    I mean, when seeing ‘take’ you don’t think of R.
    But when having to explain the R in a solution, you think ‘ah, yes, R = take’.

    Thanks nms for your fine blog and, as far as I am concerned, a pitch-perfect Quiptic despite the imperfections.

15. Thanks for drawing attention to ‘woman’ = W, Sil. I meant to check that before posting the blog but forgot.

    It’s in the Chambers Crossword Dictionary, but not in Chambers itself, or Collins or the ODE. Nor is it in Chambers XWD. I wonder if the entry in the CCD is just an error?

16. Or women’s.

17. Only a fairly good Quiptic, because of the problem with GO-BETWEEN and the not-so-sweet SWEETTALK. I only knew ADUMBRATE as “foreshadow”, so that was a new meaning for me.

    Thanks, Pan and nms.

18. nms @13, gosh, I did not know Ximenes was setting crosswords as long ago 1423!

19. I enjoyed this puzzle.

    I did not know that R = recipe/take and HOOKE’S LAW was also new to me.

    My favourites were SLOWCOACH, SWEET TALK, CHARLES DICKENS.

    Thank you Pan and nms

20. Cookie @8

    I beleive that Rx for recipe originates as plain R with a stroke across its tail.

    For 18A, I confidently put in STOKES LAW, before noticing that it was not quite an anagram.

21. In 23D, I would have described YETI as a (presumably) mythical creature, rather than mythologiical.

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