The puzzle may be found at https://www.theguardian.com/crosswords/cryptic/27291.
Another splendid crossword from Philistine. The Special Instructions refer to the four quarters of the Old City of JERUSALEM (19A), namely CHRISTIAN (14A), ARMENIAN (23A), JEWISH (24A) and MUSLIM (6D). In addition, there are several religious themed answers and some nicely cryptic and unexpected definitions (‘expecting trouble’ in particular).
| Across | ||
| 1 | ISLAMIC | Terror group erroneously claim to be this (7) |
| A charade of IS (Islamic State, or Daesh or whatever, ‘terror group’) plus LAMIC, an anagram (‘erroneously’) of ‘claim’, with an extended definition. | ||
| 5 | AMNESTY | Welcoming home girl getting pardon (7) |
| An envelope (‘welcoming’) of NEST (‘home’) in AMY (‘girl’). | ||
| 10 | ABEL | A sound measure of the third man (4) |
| A charade of ‘a’ plus BEL (‘sound measure’; as it is a rather large physical unit, the tenth part, decibel, is much better known). We had ABEL as ‘the third man’ – ‘man’ as masculine, preceded by Adam and Cain – in Mondays’ Rufus. | ||
| 11 | FLIES BLIND | What pilot does when seeing problematic rubbish bins filled (5,5) |
| An anagram (‘rubbish’) of ‘bins filled’. | ||
| 12 | EASTER | See art or 27 as represented in overseas territory celebration (6) |
| Definition and three wordplays: an anagram (‘represented’) of ‘see art’; or of TREE (the answer to clue ’27’) plus ‘as’; or a hidden answer (‘in’, maybe with ‘represented’ co-opted again) in ‘oversEAS TERritory’ | ||
| 13 | HAIL MARY | Man like Esau in Spooner’s prayer (4,4) |
| A Spoonerism of HAIRY MALE (‘man like Esau’). The word order suggests that the tail ends of the words are being exchanged, whereas a Spoonerism generally transposes the initial sounds – and, of course, the clue would read more naturally if HAIRY MALE were the answer. | ||
| 14 | CHRISTIAN | Convertible car in this quarter (9) |
| An anagram (‘convertible’) of ‘car in this’, for the thematic ‘quarter’ of the Old City of Jerusalem. | ||
| 16 | PSYCH | Mentally prepare note to the far right of Germany and Switzerland (5) |
| A charade of PS (‘note’) plus Y (‘the far right of GermanY‘) plus CH (‘Switzerland’, IVR). | ||
| 17 | USURP | Seize chateau at last by surprise? Not half! (5) |
| A charade of U (‘chateaU at last’) plus ‘SURP[rise]’ minus its last four letters (‘not half’). | ||
| 19 | JERUSALEM | City in France, I trust, unwrapped fancy meal (9) |
| A charade of JE (‘in France, I’) plus RUS (‘tRUSt unwrapped’) plus ALEM, an anagram (‘fancy’) of ‘meal’. This is the ‘fifth’ referred to in the preamble. | ||
| 23 | ARMENIAN | Blokes in song by northern quarter (8) |
| An envelope (‘in’) of MEN (‘blokes’) in ARIA (‘song’) plus N (‘northern’), for the ‘quarter’ of the Old City of Jerusalem. | ||
| 24 | JEWISH | Quarter aspiration after jet engine starts (6) |
| A charade of J E (‘Jet Engine starts’) plus WISH (‘aspiration’), for the ‘quarter’ of the Old City of Jerusalem. | ||
| 26 | SERIALISED | Top player pocketing Arab cash is in parts (10) |
| An envelope (‘in’) of RIAL (‘Arab cash’; various Arabic currencies, sometimes spelled riyal) plus ‘is’ in SEED (‘top player’). | ||
| 27 | TREE | Pine, perhaps, when one leaves Scottish island (4) |
| T[i]REE (‘Scottish island’ in the Inner Hebrides) minus the I (‘when one leaves’). | ||
| 28 | ATHEISM | Lack of faith in so many leaders chasing articles (7) |
| A charade of A THE (‘articles’) plus ISM (‘In So Many leaders’). | ||
| 29 | ADORING | Very fond of a party group (7) |
| A charade of ‘a’ plus DO (‘party’) plus RING (‘group’). | ||
| Down | ||
| 2 | SABBATH | Time off creating soap and bubbles, primarily here? (7) |
| A charade of S A B (‘Soap And Bubbles primarily’) plus BATH (‘here’ with a kind of extended definition). | ||
| 3 | ALLOT | Dish out a great deal, we hear (5) |
| Sounds like (‘we hear’) A LOT (‘a great deal’). | ||
| 4 | INFARCT | Dead heart, say, is actually about right (7) |
| An envelope (‘about’) of R (‘right’) in IN FACT (‘actually’). INFARCT is tissue which has died because of lack of oxygenated blood; in the case of a heart attack, it is a myocardial infarction. | ||
| 6 | MUSLIM | Selfie regularly appears in mother’s quarter (6) |
| An envelope (‘appears in’) of SLI (‘SeLfIe regularly’) in MUM (‘mother’). About a ‘quarter’ of the world’s population is MUSLIM, but the definition here refers to the thematic ‘quarter’ of the Old City of Jerusalem. | ||
| 7 | ECLAMPSIA | Expecting trouble with seafood pie, as cooked outside (9) |
| An envelope (‘outside’) of CLAM (‘seafood’) in EPSIA, an anagram (‘cooked’) of ‘pie as’. | ||
| 8 | TANTRIC | Of 21 philosophy carried by a distant rickshaw (7) |
| The answer to clue ’21’ is EASTERN; a hidden answer (‘carried by’) in ‘a disTANT RICkshaw’. | ||
| 9 | PIG-HEADEDNESS | Shape designed to represent obstinacy (3-10) |
| An anagram (‘to re-present’) of ‘shape designed’. | ||
| 15 | ISRAELITE | Harsh realities for a citizen of ancient kingdom (9) |
| An anagram (‘harsh’) of ‘realities’. | ||
| 18 | SERPENT | One tempted mother of ten and paid out without hesitation (7) |
| An envelope (‘without’) of ER (‘hesitation’) in SPENT (‘paid out’). ‘ten’ in the definition refers to the answer to 10A, ABEL, whose mother was Eve. | ||
| 20 | UNJADED | Fresh in Frankfurt and green on the inside (7) |
| An envelope (‘on the inside’) of JADE (‘green’) in UND (‘in Frankfurt and’). | ||
| 21 | EASTERN | 12 noon and it’s heading to 90° (7) |
| A charade of EASTER (the answer to clue ’12’) plus N (‘noon’). | ||
| 22 | BIBLES | With some aplomb, I bless King James and co (6) |
| A hidden answer (‘some’) in’aplomB I BLESs’. | ||
| 25 | WATER | Chestnut or biscuit? (5) |
| WATER may precede either ‘chestnut’ or ‘biscuit’. The question mark is for the allusiveness of the references. | ||
The theme was very helpful, and I enjoyed solving this puzzle.
I needed help to parse 18d, 21d, SAB of 2d, BEL in 10a.
Thanks PeterO and Philistine.
Good one, Philistine! ‘Expecting trouble’ is outstanding.
And PeterO, thanks for the quick and accurate explanations. I failed to parse 27, not knowing the island of Tiree.
Even better! The grid has the four quarters of old Jerusalem in the same relative positions as the real thing. Really impressive, Philistine!
http://www.conservapedia.com/Jerusalem
A really enjoyable puzzle. Once I’d got CHRISTIAN from the anagram the other themed answers became write-ins, which helps.
I too was enamoured of “Expecting trouble” but, for me, it was pipped by my LOI, FLIES BLIND. The definition was so cunningly hidden that it never occurred to me that it could be a simple anagram (despite the obvious anagrind of “rubbish”).
Thanks, Philistine and PeterO.
Yes, a really good puzzle. I was slow to start, but got ARMENIAN and then realised what was going on. Favourites were ECLAMPSIA, USURP and HAIL MARY. Many thanks to Philistine and PeterO.
Thanks Philistine and PeterO
I’m afraid that I solved this without having a clue what was going on with the “quarters”. ECLAMPSIA was my favourite. 13 seems to clue MALE HAIRY.
Thanks Philistine, PeterO
Very impressive, also enjoyable with some particularly good clues. I liked AMNESTY and HAIL MARY, and lots more.
I don’t think it’s necessary to bend the Spoonerism – Man like Esau gives us ‘male hairy’, which then gives HAIL MARY in the usual way.
I can only add to the above. First class puzzle. I am still smiling at 7 down. Thank you Doctor! (and PeterO)
A very enjoyable puzzle, and despite having to resort to electronic assistance at the very end I felt quite pleased at having managed to complete it. I particularly liked JERUSALEM and ECLAMPSIA. Thanks to Philistine and PeterO
For once, I got the themes. Both the overall religious and the specific quarter references. And it certainly helped. I’m tempted to wonder if PIG HEADEDNESS is also intended to be a – rather naughty – inclusion in the religious theme?
I’m with James @7 in thinking the simpler solution is the more elegant: Man = Male; like Easau = Hairy giving us Spooner’s version of the prayer.
ECLAMPSIA and FLIES BLIND are both brilliant. ISLAMIC meets my definition of an &Lit and, for that, gets my COTD.
Thanks for an enjoyable morning to both Philistine and PeterO
Got the theme quickly because I remembered the first chapter of Edward Whittemore’s ‘Jerusalem Poker’.
Brilliant puzzle and great blog. Huge thanks to both – I loved it!
Liked this a lot. Great mix of theme and medical thingies. I was familiar with INFRACT but not INFARCT.had to be one of them!
Thanks Peter O and Philistine.
Thanks PeterO for the extra EASTER treat, didn’t see them all.
And thankyou slipstream @ 3 pointing out the discovery of the grid placement of the quarters. Philistine in deed, not in name.
Expecting trouble with the hairy male were special.
Quite a challenge this morning, but none the worse for that. Too many good clues to list individually, but “eclampsia” & “Hail Mary” stand out for me.
Many thanks to Philistine & PeterO.
Can only add to the plaudits. First class stuff. And thanks too to slipstream for spotting what I would never have spotted but am so happy to now know about.
Yes, not only was ABEL familiar from Monday, we had TREE yesterday too, but that couldn’t have been edited out without diminishing an excellent puzzle with a very clever gridfill. All very enjoyable.
Thanks to Philistine and PeterO
A gem of a puzzle — a fantastic way to end the week! Like Mark Hartshorne @10, ISLAMIC was my CotD, which I also considered an &Lit. I also loved FLIES BLIND, ECLAMPSIA, HAIL MARY, USURP, and the brilliant “mother of ten” in 18d, among many other fine clues. Many thanks to Philistine and PeterO.
Thanks to Philistine and PeterO. Great fun. I too started by parsing ARMENIAN which in turn led to the other quarters (though JERUSALEM was my LOI – I needed all the crossers). Tiree and INFARCT were new to me and I needed help parsing PSYCH.
Thank you Philistine for a great crossword and PeterO for a super blog.
PIG-HEADEDNESS says it all. In addition to slipstream’s observation @3, there is “TANTRIC EASTERN”, perhaps referring to the peace-teaching of Tantrism…
I was impressed by the grid fill of the theme. 5a might even have extended the theme if it had used “quarter” instead “pardon”. Also, “Seize chateau at last by surprise? Not half!” might have been better as “Seize last chateau by surprise? Not half!” as I thought the “at last” generates a “T”.
The parsing for “PSYCH” eluded me and I had to reveal that in the end. I resorted to Google to identify Esau’s phenotype before the Spoonerism dawned although there was no reference in the clue to the foreign grammar or the homophone, which didn’t help, either.
Absolutely lovely crossword.
I think 13A is more straightforward than you describe – I read it as a spoonerism of “Male [A man], hairy [like Esau]”.
Incidentally, Eid al-Adha, starts today, best wishes to any Muslim solvers here, Eid mubarak.
Many thanks Philistine and Peter0.
This was a lovely crossword. I got the quarters fairly quickly after solving 6dn, although the Armenian quarter was unknown to me. And I should like to join those praising 13ac and 7dn (even though I generally don’t like Spooner clues).
Like Chris in France @4 I missed the obvious anagram in 11ac: I had “flies” but thought it might be flies around, as characteristic of filled bins.
Josh @22
Indeed: that would dispose of the main quibble I mentioned in the blog. Thanks.
Yup, top notch. All in full working order.
And enjoyed the inclusion of atheism for the rest of us.
Thanks both.
A truly excellent crossword and a fine end to a great week of puzzles.
Beautiful puzzle. Thanks to slipstream @3 for pointing out the extra subtlety of the gridfill. Reminiscent of the Berlin Wall puzzle. 18 also put me in mind of Crispa’s famously brilliant clue “Men’s my one failing, (mother of nine)”.
The theme did help quite a bit, e.g. with CHRISTIAN and ARMENIAN among others. I missed the hidden word part of EASTER, thinking that “overseas territory” referred simply to Easter Island. No matter – the Philistine trademark multiple wordplay clue was more than enough to see the answer.
A little eerie to have a similarly defined TREE both yesterday and today. Both are nice examples of DBEs used to produce natural surfaces.
Thanks to both Philistine and PeterO for my morning’s entertainment.
Bracoman@27:
My thoughts exactly. Again thanks to both.
Yes, very nice puzzle. HAIL MARY made me smile and I’m a sucker for a good Spoonerism. ABEL was LOI despite it being used earlier in the week. Too many goodies to list.
Thanks Philistine.
It was like untying a knot: totally absorbing and very satisfying at the finish. Thanks Philistine and PeterO
Great puzzle – thanks to Philistine and PeterO – I’m with Chris in France @4 re 11A pipping 7D for favourite – the definition was very cleverly disguised – being something of a 28A I wasn’t completely familiar with the quarters and had managed to convince myself that “suit” (pursuit) could be “aspiration” which gave me “JESUIT” at 24A – oh dear, held me up for a while…
Hands up to Jesuit, too.
According to Wiki the The New dictionary of cultural literacy. by Eric Donald Hirsch; Joseph F. Kett; James S. Trefil (2002). says
A spoonerism is an error in speech or deliberate play on words in which corresponding consonants, vowels, or morphemes are switched between two words in a phrase.
and the 1924 edition of the Oxford English Dictionary says a Spoonerism is:
An accidental transposition of the initial sounds, or other parts, of two or more words.
(This is still the entry in the current OED)
So Philistine is exhonerated. 🙂
Most enjoyable. I join others in praise of “expecting trouble”.
“12 noon” gave me “High Noon” which gave me WESTERN, which stopped me in my tracks for a while.
Philistine is one of my firmest favourites.
Must agree that ECLAMPSIA (“Expecting trouble…”) was admirable – one one feels bound to add to any special lists one might keep of such treasures. I rather liked the &littish ISLAMIC too.
Many thanks to one and both.
Thanks all
I agree with PeterO in all respects.
One of my first solved was Armenians which meant nothing as my familiarity with Jerusalem is nil. I was still on NEWS for quarters..
Last in was infarct which was very poor since I have had one!
Berry hiker @10, what exactly is a very clever grid fill, not I hope an American football term!
Just wanted to pop in and say how much I liked this one. If you’d told me I’d enjoy a religiously-themed crossword before this puzzle came along, I’d not have believed you… Great stuff.
RCW @39 – I thought that was self-explanatory, but maybe I have spent too much time listening to setters. The gridfill is the choice of solutions and their placement as opposed to the way they are clued, and I was just agreeing with others that it was very clever to put the quarters in the right parts of the “map”.