Guardian 27,364 / Shed

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A fun prize puzzle from Shed – not too tough, and we didn’t spot any particular theme, but might well have missed something!

CARBONADO was one of those satisfying clues where you work out what the word must be, and then find it does actually exist 🙂 HECATOMB was our last one in – the “Tom-tom heading off” is clever, but not very forgiving when the answer is an unusual word as well!

Across

1. Particular variety of sheep’s head and guts (6)
STRIPE
S[heep] = “sheep’s head” + TRIPE = “guts”
Definition: “Particular variety”

4. What shouldn’t happen on a peninsula? (6)
CRIMEA
CRIME = “What shouldn’t happen” + A
Definition: “peninsula?”

9. Little cakes turned over — or up? (4)
SNUB
BUNS = “Little cakes” reversed (turned over)
Definition: “[turned] up?”, as in “snub-nosed”

10. Imposing boundaries on Mantel’s last copy (10)
LIMITATION
[mante]L = “Mantel’s last” + IMITATION = “copy”
Definition: “Imposing boundaries” (I don’t think this quite works for me – wouldn’t “imposing boundaries” (in a verb sense) be ‘limiting’ instead, or if it’s a noun sense (like ‘impressive boundaries’), ‘limitations’?

11. Interference with musical holding it back (6)
STATIC
CATS = “musical” around IT all reversed
Definition: “Interference”

12. Surgeon, one formerly employed in telephone exchange (8)
OPERATOR
Double definition: a surgeon is someone who operators (i.e. an OPERATOR), and there used to be OPERATORs working in telephone exchanges that you could talk to.

13. Fuss after swindle involving return of supporter’s diamond (9)
CARBONADO
ADO = “Fuss” after CON = “swindle” around BRA = “supporter” reversed
Definition: “diamond” (a new word for us)

15. Part of India’s left end (4)
GOAL
GOA = “Part of India” + L = “left”
Definition: “end”

16. Split up role (4)
PART
Double definition: “Split up” and “role” (e.g. in a play)

17. Shout about barren waste yielding fruit (9)
CRANBERRY
CRY = “Shout” around (BARREN)*
Definition:

21. Tom-tom heading off to Belgium for sacrifice (8)
HECATOMB
HE-CAT = “Tom” + [t]OM = “tom heading off” + B = “Belgium”
Definition: Definition: “sacrifice” – another new word for us…

22. Good antique, antiquely precious (6)
GOLDEN
G = “Good” + OLDEN = “antique, antiquely” (“OLDEN” is an old-fashioned way of saying “antique”)
Definition: “precious”

24. Backward glance sees traditional religious order originally held in esteem (10)
RETROSPECT
T[raditional] R[eligious] O[rder] = “traditional religious order originally” in RESPECT = “esteem”
Definition: “Backward glance”

25. Backing instrument’s border (4)
ABUT
TUBA = “instrument” reversed
Definition: “border” (as a verb: to abut something is to border it)

26. Redistribute booze to soprano dropped from higher accompaniment (6)
DECANT
S = “soprano” removed from DESCANT = “higher accompaniment”
Definition: “Redistribute booze”

27. Decorate journalist receiving summons? On the contrary (6)
BEDECK
ED = “journalist” in BECK = “summons”
Definition: “Decorate”

Down

1. Artisan nobbled crooner (7)
SINATRA
(ARTISAN)*
Definition: “crooner”

2. Nick turned to automaton (5)
ROBOT
ROB = “Nick” + TO reversed
Definition: “automaton”

3. Bird, 51, cracked nut (7)
PELICAN
LI = “51” in PECAN = “nut”
Definition: “Bird”

5. Lifted supermarket right off (6)
ROTTEN
NETTO = “supermarket” + R = “right”
Definition: “off”

6. Help for addict swamping party in gas (9)
METHADONE
DO = “party” in METHANE = “gas”
Definition: “Help for addict”

7. Look into oxtail soup, fishing out one amphibian (7)
AXOLOTL
(OXTAL)* around LO = “Look”. The anagram fodder is from “oxtail” without the I (“fishing out one”)
Definition: “amphibian”

8. “Things beyond our ken … “: poem lesbian doctor’s rewritten (13)
IMPONDERABLES
(POEM LESBIAN DR)
Definition: “Things beyond our ken”

14. Second endlessly supporting bass solo about weight problems (9)
BARIATRIC
TRIC[e] = “Second endlessly” (as in “in a trice” / “in a second”) underneath B = “Bass” + ARIA = “solo”
Definition: “about weight problems”

16. Falsely claim to nurse in advance? (7)
PRETEND
PRE-TEND = “nurse in advance?”
Definition: “Falsely claim”

18. Close bond with something to sleep in (7)
NIGHTIE
NIGH = “Close” + TIE = “bond”
Definition: “something to sleep in”

19. Die, held up by mythical bird or stag (7)
ROEBUCK
CUBE = “Die” reversed in ROK = “mythical bird”
Definition: “stag”

20. Can Oriental money reduce restraint? (6)
LOOSEN
LOO = “Can” + SEN = “Oriental money”
Definition: “reduce restraint?”

23. Contract bridge opponents carrying field (5)
LEASE
LEA = “field” + SE = “bridge opponents” (South and East)
Definition: “Contract”

22 comments on “Guardian 27,364 / Shed”

  1. Thanksmhl. 4A and 5D defeated me on the day but did reveal themselves on Wednesday when I returned to the task. NETTO indeed. Had to look that up with a harrumph; earlier, and just to check, I looked up BARIATRIC, a useful addition to my knowledge.

  2. Thanks mhl. I agree, fun without being too taxing. Like molonglo I had to seek assistance with NETTO and I had the same problem with 10a as you. The answer for 3d is PELICAN of course.

  3. Thanks to Shed and mhl. I too had to look up Netto as supermarket and had trouble spelling AXOLOTL but I did know HECATOMB. Enjoyable and not too difficult.

  4. I solved this in one sitting in about 40 minutes, finding nothing too difficult. I will admit to biffing ‘hecatomb’ and figuring out the wordplay later, which can happen if you read a lot of Homer and Aeschylus. I had more or less heard of ‘carbonado’, but had to lean on the cryptic a little for help.

    I don’t really see any problem with ‘limitation’ – as a noun, its root meaning is the act of limiting.

  5. 19dn. Roebuck
    I couldn’t find rok as an alternative spelling for roc in any dictionary.
    Strange that nobody else mentioned this.
    Barbara

  6. I solved this in a mere four weeks

    Seriously though LOI was ROTTEN-it fit with the crossers and the def so I unparsed it and looked up NETTO which operated in the UK for a short period.Danish I think.
    Thanks for blog and thanks Shed.

  7. Barbara @5 – the copy of Chambers I have on my iPad gives rok as an alternative for roc, but it wasn’t an option i was aware of – and I can see the spellchecker doesn’t like it either. I didn’t know of NETTO, and BARIATRIC was new to me as well.

    I did know HECATOMB – I’ve only come across it once, but it stuck in my mind. Many years ago, stuck somewhere rather out of the way, with a rather dull and limited library, I found someone had left a copy of “Hecatombe pour OSS 117”. With my somewhat limited French and a dictionary, I worked through it. The OSS117 book (there are a lot!) are about a Bond-like character, with a Bond-like number, who actually predates Bond himself, I believe. I remember nothing about the book – and I’ve never attempted any of the others – but the title stuck, partly because I was never quite sure what it meant. I’m pretty sure the dictionary helpfully translated ‘hecatombe’ as ‘hecatomb’, but that didn’t help and I didn’t have a decent English dictionary. (There were a couple of passable OSS117 films not that long ago, but they were played for laughs, which I don’t think the original books were.)

    And I thought the ‘tom-tom’ clue was really neat.

    So thanks, Shed, for reminding me of that, and to mhl.

  8. Thanks Shed and mhl, a most enjoyable puzzle.
    I liked the use of ‘swamping’ as the inclusion indicator in 6d, as an alternative name for methane is swamp gas.
    Have a nice weekend all.

  9. Wasn’t sure about ROEBUCK – a ‘stag’ can only be the male of the Red Deer, not other species such as the Roe Deer – am I right? And ROK as an alternative to ROC is a most unusual spelling – but it’s in Chambers! It’s the word from which the chess-piece ROOK is derived, I believe.

    Everything else was fine – perhaps not the hardest of Prizes but we’ve come to accept that. Particularly liked HECATOMB (yes I did know the word). “He-cat” ha ha!

    Thanks as always to Shed and Mhl.

  10. KeithS @7 – the word HECATOMB appears as a chapter-heading in Jules Verne’s 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea – albeit, perhaps, wrongly applied there. I thought it meant something like “mass murder” until I looked it up.

  11. I liked this, with
    the possible exception of NETTO of which I’ve never heard. However, all was forgiven with the excellent HECATOMB and one could chortle along with SINATRA.
    Thanks Shed.

  12. I did not mention earlier that I too had been puzzled by ROK as opposed to ROC because I assumed that someone somewhere would come up with that spelling.

  14. I enjoyed the top half but got stumped by an overflap of unfamiliar words at the bottom such CARBONADO, BARIATRIC and HECATOMB and didn’t complete. Maybe next time.

  15. Thanks all. With hindsight, I regret 5dn: Netto was my supermarket of choice for several years and pretty ubiquitous in the north-east of England where I then lived, but obviously less well-known elsewhere except perhaps Scandinavia. But a bit of a general-knowledge clue in any case.

    FirmlyDrac@10: I’d always vaguely supposed hecatomb meant mass grave until I had to look it up because I wanted to write a clue for it.

  16. HECATOMB and CARBONADO were vaguely recognisable to me but had to be confirmed by looking up. BARIATRIC seemed more familiar, but isn’t in my old Chambers, so I wondered if I’d made it up at first, before finding it in Collins online.

    I have heard of Netto before but that was my LOI as I didn’t think of Netto till I’d guessed ROTTEN from def and crossers.

    I too was surprised at rok as an alternative to the better known roc. Also interested to learn it could be the origin of rook, the chess piece (thanks, FirmlyDirac), both being derived, per Chambers, from the Persian, rukh. Harry Golombek (in “Chess, a History”) says the name of the piece in Persian means “chariot”. People in oriental fables did ride on rocs, didn’t they?

    Mhl, re LIMITATION, -ing firms are often nounal, aren’t they? Typo in 12a, btw: “someone who operators”.

  18. I enjoyed this puzzle a lot, as far as I can remember. Seems a long time ago since I did it. I managed to parse everything in the end, and often I’m too lazy to bother.

    I didn’t know NETTO so Googled to check, and HECATOMB was new to me, but probably my favourite. The tom-tom heading off amused me.

    I notice that although BARIATRIC is not in my 2003 Chambers, it does put in an appearance in a newer edition (2014, I think). Maybe something to do with the rise of gastric bands for obesity treatment in recent years, though I’d have thought the word would always have been in common usage in medical circles.

    Thank you Shed and Mhl.

  19. Tony @16:
    “Mhl, re LIMITATION, -ing forms are often nounal, aren’t they?
    Yes, that’s called a gerund (fond memories of Latin at school here!)
    Crossbar@18: BARIATRIC may not be in all dictionaries but is sadly becoming all too common in the media, owing to the obesity pandemic 🙁 . Certainly I didn’t need to look up the word!

  20. An odd mixture – the first few seemed very easy but a few tricky ones at the end meant that this was quite a satisfying challenge. As always Shed’s clueing is precise and fair.

    Thanks to Shed and mhl

  21. Thanks for the blog, mhl.

    Very late to the party, so probably only you will see this – but my comment is mainly directed at you, anyway: great to see a picture of you, since we haven’t seen you at S and Bs lately – still looking good. 😉

    [I’m late because I’ve been away on my annual pre-Christmas visit to my son in Copenhagen, so no problems for me with NETTO – but, oddly, I didn’t know of the UK connection.]

    Thanks to Shed for the enjoyable puzzle.

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